


Hugs and Kisses, Lord Voldemort

by Pie (potteresque_ire)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Auror Harry Potter, Awkward Romance, Community: hd_smoochfest, Fluff and Humor, Happy Ending, Interior Designer Draco Malfoy, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-26
Updated: 2010-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 20:27:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 38,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7329550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/potteresque_ire/pseuds/Pie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Draco, an aspiring interior designer, sent the leftovers of Lord Voldemort's favorite chocolate to Harry Potter after the war, in the form of a work-in-progress chocolate replica of No. 4, Privet Drive. The only condition of the gift was it would never be mentioned beyond the owls, and Draco and Potter would break ties once the house was complete. But then, an attack by Neo Death Eaters led to Junior Auror Potter's assignment as Draco’s protective custodian, and Draco realized that his story with Potter belonged to both the past and the present, and possibly, the future. An almost romance featuring a bedful of dildos, packs of instant noodles, mannequins who ogled, and of course, lots and lots of chocolate.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sugar and Spice, and Everything Nice

**Author's Note:**

> The chocolates that form the basis of this story are Hershey’s Hugs & Kisses—popular among Americans, and I apologize for making them Voldie's favorite sweets (and atrocities to the rest of Wizardkind). Aside from the usual disclaimer, I solemnly swear I didn’t get anything from the competitors of Hershey’s or the makers of Batchelor’s Instant Noodles. Written for golden_snitch12, 2010 hd_smoochfest on Livejournal.

  **~* February, 2003 *~**

 

 

The package was a plain cardboard box—it’s always a surprising sight, considering its sender.

Harry spread out the attached note, folded into a paper crane. The message was unsigned, as usual, and longer than the previous ones.

 

> “This is the final piece for the house, Potter. It won’t do to have bedrooms up on the first floor and no way to get there. For once, it isn’t quite a replica. I ran out of material when I swore I had one more piece of that blasphemy that’d dared to call itself chocolate.
> 
> You can get more of those from the Muggles, presumably, but who knows whether they’re the same without the ‘special’ touch.
> 
> No, this house does not exist outside the realm of these owls, my imagination and your oven. Voldemort didn’t make Professor Snape deliver the chocolates to the Manor, he didn’t leave it here because he’s on a diet. I didn’t get rid of them by taking advantage of your Gryffindor sentimentality.
> 
> The past is not easy to quit, Potter. Consider yourself the last dose of an addictive potion I’m weaning myself off. You’re my one remaining link to the past these days—an unlikely one, I admit, but I reckon you wish to move on as much as I do, if not more.”

 

With a sigh and a wave of his wand, the oven door in the open kitchen swung open and Harry’s—or was it Draco’s?—chocolate house came flying towards the coffee table. It had never been baked, of course, and the sweet was well preserved by magic, but the shelf there was just the right size for storage in Harry’s tiny flat. It was also a safe place to be, given it’s located right above the pots and pans Harry used often to cook his instant meals. Auror training and Muggle self-defence classes had often left him too tired in the evenings to make a proper dinner for himself.

A gentle _Wingardium Leviosa_ later, the roof wiggled itself out of the walls, its chimneys blowing off a puff of smoke. Harry set it aside and looked into the house, already furnished in the exactly same way as when he’d left it five years ago, on a motorcycle, save for…

The top floor yielded with a nudge, swiveling aside to hover above the flowerbed in the garden, blooming in its swirls of white and dark chocolate. The wallpaper, sensing light and magic, tautened their relaxed, curled corners and slapped itself back into the walls. On the lower floor, the kitchen counters blew themselves clean, until they were spotless as Aunt Petunia had liked them. The sofa took a deep breath to emulate the dent from the combined weight of Uncle Vernon and Dudley through the years.

Harry picked up the cardboard box and tore off the Spellotape. Soon, his hand was reaching into the cold, dense mist that had cushioned the gift for delivery. He reached in, felt around for what he expected to be a wedge of chocolate—zigzags for the stairs on one side and a small door with many broken locks on one of its faces.

The content was smaller than he’d thought. Maybe a few steps were missing, Harry thought, as he cupped the frosted piece on his palms and blew it warm. Ice crystals flew aside, glistening dust subsiding to reveal the steps, the white chocolate carpet on dark chocolate wood and—

—nothing else.

Harry spelled a Revealing Charm. Still, nothing.

Draco had rebuilt the entire No. 4 Privet Drive, save for its cupboard under the stairs. Harry smiled, held on to the two sides of the stairwell with his fingers and fit it to the end of the hallway, using the Adhesion Spell Draco had taught him in an owl. Free to extend itself once more, the stairs stretched, sighed and wiggled a little.

As it melded into position, Harry could almost see the magic, the place coming alive before his eyes. He almost expected to hear Dudley’s incessant whining, Uncle Vernon’s grunting and Aunt Petunia’s gossiping, even Aunt Marge’s slurping and Ripper’s growling.

But the cuckoo clock in the dining room remained still and silent. When the Dursleys had gone out for their Sunday fun without Harry—to the park, the Autumn fair, and all those places Harry’d been dying to go, its tick-tock, tick-tock had accompanied him through the afternoons. If he’d finished his chores early, he’d sit by the dining table and sulk, kicking his legs as he decided whether he wanted time to fly by faster—just so he could see Dudley’s miserable face upon his return, or whether he wanted time to linger, because … Dudley’s miserable face upon his return could only another session of Harry Hunting.

But home was home, even if it was shared by a terror of a cousin…

…Or by a headcase of a Dark Lord, who also happened to have questionable taste in chocolates.

“ _Accio_ Lego Men and camera!” Harry called out. His disposable camera hopped off the shelf to land before him and zooming towards him from his bedroom—he could hear their swish—as if they were riding a broom and chasing a Snitch—were the two figurines he’d saved for the moment, one with dark hair and the other light. They looked as happy as they had been when he’d bought them from a Muggle toy store, their yellow plastic faces painted with two dots for eyes and a simple smile. Harry set them down in the living room, picked up the camera and took a picture.

The camera, a free gift from the Weasley’s joke shop, yelped “the sight is vomit-inducing!”, coughed and spat out its artwork—a stationary photo, but it would do. After all, it was a model of a Muggle house, occupied by Muggle playthings. He pulled out a ballpoint pen from the back pocket of his jeans, wrote ‘Thank You’ on the back and was about to run to the kitchen to grab the chocolates he had picked up from Russia—the trip had been his very first out-of-country excursion as an Auror—when he thought he’d seen the cardboard box shudder.

The shudder became more evident as Harry blew away the mist still hovering above the space inside. Louder, too, was the light rattling coming from within. The poor thing that was almost frozen to death finally came into view—a lone piece of chocolate, onion shaped and wrapped in silver.

Harry extended his hand and as soon as the forgotten sweet felt the warmth from his flesh, it jiggled its way onto his fingers. He could feel the magic inside it, the magic that made it everlasting—still carrying a Dark edge in its signature—diffused by a fainter, more recent addition that had no doubt given it the power to Transform.

A light tickle on his fingertips and Harry closed his hand in reflex. The chocolate emitted a muffled but happy sigh in the warmth and something that was a part of it, something caught between Harry’s fingers, stretched and lapped on Harry’s knuckles.

Harry flipped the white tag to its back. On the strip of paper was one simple word— _'Kisses'_ — printed in the hue of the early summer skies.

 

  

*~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* 

 

**1\. Sugar and Spice, and Everything Nice**

Of all the things Draco Malfoy expected to see when he opened his eyes, a Git-Saviour drooling over the article on Quidditch Hunk of the Year wasn’t one of them.

Did it surprise him? Surely not. After all, Draco Malfoy, ex Death Eater Extraordinaire (he’s VERY ordinary among those wizards), had once woken up to the sight of the Dark Lord stealing a tube of facemask from his vanity table (in his Babbitty Rabitty themed pajamas, in case anyone cared to know). But Draco would prefer to have a mediwizard in his company rather than someone who had almost killed him—in a toilet, of all places.

The Cute One, maybe, who had performed the diagnostics on Draco every morning? He and his long, thick Healing Wand, drawing circles all over Draco’s face…

But Draco digressed. His mind had a way of wandering, the culprit of his ending up in St. Mungo’s a few days ago, a Dark Mark burnt into one of his cheeks and the word “Traitor” carved into his other. During one of those mind-numbing routines in which he had tidied up his client’s flat pre-makeover, he had touched a Dark artifact, a hot pink boa scarf hidden in the closet.

His customer had claimed no knowledge of its existence. Given that all the other clothes in the closet had made McGonagall’s wardrobe look avant garde, Draco had felt inclined to believe her. Not that he hadn’t cursed her to (fashion) hell and back as the Aurors had escorted him to the hospital.

The mark had been a shade of angry red and looked sharp at the edges, which reminded Draco of—

Right. Back to this hospital room. Sitting by his bed was neither Voldemort nor The Cute One nor the Tartan Witch but one Mr Harry Potter, leaned against the back of a cheap plastic chair and rocking on its legs as he read the latest issue of _Which Broom? (Special Edition! Quidditich Hunk of 2003 Centrefold Inside!)_ , Engorgioed and propped against Draco’s knee. Cradled between his hands was a steaming mug.

Draco sniffed. Mmmm. Chocolate.

The hot chocolate sold by the machine behind the Spell Damage ward was among the best kept secret of St Mungo’s, and Draco had paid it daily pilgrimage during his visit.

 

 

On the bedside table, the water glass did a jig, then took off and flew into Harry’s freed hand. Eyes still undressing the Quidditch Hunk on the magazine (no small feat given the level of precision needed, considering how little The Hunk was wearing), Potter poured a good portion of his drink into the glass and spelled it to float above Draco. “Here.”

How did he know Draco was awake?

Draco sat up and reached for the glass, his fingers barely touching it when a shriek came from the other side of the room.

“NOTHING BUT WATER, PUMPKIN JUICE OR CHICKEN SOUP FOR THE PATIENT!!!”

That was when Potter finally looked up and around the room. And for the first time in years, Draco had a good view of the face of his former schoolmate.

The spectacles were still there, but wire-rimmed and the lens spelled so thin that they were almost invisible. The dark hair was still an untamed mess, but exquisitely styled to an I-just-shagged-on-my-bed-no-wait-I-creamed-the-carpet-it’s-that-wild look. (Who’d been his barberwizard or his … shaggerwizard? Inquiring minds needed to know.) The lightning bolt scar on the forehead was still sharp—

A light plop! The bunch of white daffodils that had been on the counter across the room dived into Draco’s glass.

 _Aaaaahhhhhh,_ the flowers sighed. A faint shade of brown was seeping into the petals from the tips. _Yes._

“Share and they don’t complain.” Potter tilted his head and smiled at Draco. He downed his own drink, already near the last drop, closed the Which Broom? and stood. His back turned to face Draco for a moment as he waved the chair back to its place against the wall, his other hand shoving the shrunk magazine into the back pocket of his jeans.

His tight jeans. His tight jeans hugging the curves of a tighter arse.

Draco took a big gulp of chocolate.

Potter was oblivious, that’s for certain—for the jeans and arse soon landed on the bed, centimeters from where Draco felt ... tight. Leaning forward, Potter squinted and fixed his gaze upon Draco’s face.

The rich, silky sweetness of chocolate glided down Draco’s throat. One side of his brain was in overdrive, his gray and white matter looping around one another in Karma Sutra bendiness. The other side of his mind, however, had decided to wander to his inner archive and recall the moment right before The Cute One had fired a Fainting Spell on him in Admissions. The Auror accompanying them was saying something along the lines of…

_'Blah blah blah, Neo Death Eaters blah blah blah. Blah blah Ministry blah blah blah blah protective custody blah blah blah. Blah blah blah, our very best blah blah blah. Blah blah blah Men’s room? Blah blah morning coffee blah blah blah blah!'_

To Draco’s defence, Draco had been screaming bloody murder in the background then.

As for protective custody, Draco was no stranger to it. His family had been placed under one of those after the war, being witnesses in the trial of several of his father’s colleagues (specifically, those who had owed them Galleons from their Exploding Snap parties). Their protective custodian had been a junior Auror, a recent immigrant and Beaubatons graduate whose surname had been Dubois, had come to live in the Manor for a month.

In the same month, Draco had sacrificed his virginity, all for the sake of preserving the Malfoy lineage. For why else would Draco entrust the most delicate part of himself—and the source of his future offsprings—in the care of an Auror’s mouth?

So who would be his custodian this time?

Potter was still studying Draco’s injuries, his hands having crept up at some point to lift Draco’s chin a little and turned his face to the side. He smelled of chocolate.

Or rather, cocoa—not so sweet, darker and raw.

Could it be him? Could this be why he appeared uninvited by Draco’s bed, looking thoroughly at ease? Having served the Ministry for less than five years, Potter was a junior Auror. Rank wise he was suited for the assignment.

But he was … Potter. Minister Shacklebolt probably kissed his feet every morning, or his Muggle trainers.

He might have choked on the shoelaces at some point.

“Exactly like my scar. They must hurt. I’m sorry,” Potter opened up, his fingertips touching the marks on Draco’s face. “I have something—”

The door squeaked open, and Mediwizard, The Cute One, strode in with his long, thick Healing Wand. Potter retracted his hand, sprang away from the bed and fled the room, leaving Draco looking rather foolish holding a chocolaty vase of daffodils.

Drunk daffodils.

“Good morning!” The Cute One sounded as jovial as the winter’s sun pouring in through the window of this whitewashed room. It was irritating, not to say inappropriate, given this was mid July and it was pouring outside. He also looked too pale, his hair too tidy, his eyesight too good, his scar, no, wrinkle on his forehead too unremarkable…

The Cute One was not so cute after all.

Draco swallowed the last of his chocolate. Their bribe consumed, the flowers resumed their lecture regarding diet restrictions, sleeping schedule, ergonomics and one hundred and one ways to spot a fertile mate and make a dozen babies.

All boys.

 

 

“You’ve been cleared to leave. Forms all filled out. Your discharge is officially tomorrow so no one will notice us go.” Potter entered the room again as soon as The Annoying One was gone and the daffodils, sedated with cough syrup, were sleeping on the counter. He had a black garbage bag in his right hand, a white plush puppy under his left arm with enough balloons tied on it to Levitate itself and Potter together. The left side of his face was painted red with lipstick.

“Fans,” Potter said, unfazed. “Should have Glamoured myself into a wall. Didn’t expect people in non-visiting hours. Forgot the nurses.” He cast a Scourgify on his face and without much thought, placed the plush animal on the bed next to Draco. Sensing the warmth in the sheets, the puppy came to life and immediately found a new home in Draco’s arms.

“You know, Potter,” Draco patted the plush animal, “What would be a good name for the dog? Adam? Brian? Collin? Darcy? Evan... ? “I’m still waiting for you to make sense, as in, one, talking in full sentences, and two, telling me what you’re doing here.”

His wand out and his arms already spread wide like Flitwick before the Hogwarts choir, Potter froze and turned to Draco. “I thought they told you. Protective custody.” He stared at Draco then, as if he’d explained it all.

“Still waiting. Your answer.” Draco butchered his usual eloquence to mimic Potter’s . “In complete sentences. Please.” His heart was pounding; the chocolate was doing things inside him. He swore he had developed an allergy to the sweet and would die a gruesome death because of it.

Either from eating too much … or not eating enough.

“I’ll be with you most of the time for the next month. There’s no curfew like your last time. You work or go anywhere you want, anytime you want. I’ll follow.” Potter shifted his feet and lowered his voice, as if he was conspiring something with Draco. “The more places you go, the better.”

“Why? Are traveling expenses paid by the Ministry? I’d love a vacation in Paris.”

At ‘Paris’, the puppy jumped up and down and lapped Draco’s face.

Paris would be its name, then.

“I wish.” Potter shrugged and sat on the bed again, an easy grin blossoming on his face. Weren’t they supposed to hate each other? Potter was treating Draco like an old friend, or a spouse several centuries old that he hadn’t buggered since the end of the Goblin Wars.

It had to be the latter, Draco decided, tasting the lingering chocolate in his mouth.

“…visibility.” Potter was talking and Draco snapped himself back into attention, as much attention as he could garner, anyway, while an epic Goblin War romance wrote itself in his head _(Oh, my Speccy One! Save me from the filthy claws of Urg the Unclean!)_. “People should know that MLE is serious. What the Neo Death Eaters have done to you, they’ll pay with jail time.”

Hodrod the Horny-Handed was forced to retrieve his horny hand for a moment and let Draco return to the here and now. “Why aren’t you chasing them?” he asked.

A moment of hesitation. On the reflection of Potter’s glasses, Draco could see the details of the tattoo on his face: the sinister glint in the serpent’s eyes on the Dark Mark, the dagger that composed the ‘i’ of the word “Traitor”.

“Kingsley doesn’t want anything to happen to me, especially anything related to Vol…,” his eyes flickered at Draco “…the Second War.” A dash of disappointment flashed cross his face as he shrugged again. “Hurts morale. That’s what he says.”

“So he decides to hurt your morale by handing you this bloody job—of being my stand-in hexing bag.” Draco sought confirmation of Potter’s new assignment. Curse Merlin and his overnight chamber pot, his tone had carried a hint of concern, when a smirk would and should have been far more appropriate. For years he had been the Pureblood society’s poster boy and Potter had placed himself in a similar position, too idolized, too sheltered—

And good looking enough. Almost.

Finding him distracted, perhaps, Potter reached for Paris and tried to take him away from Draco. The plush puppy bit him with its toothless, felt-lined mouth.

Draco rewarded his new ally with a pat.

“I accepted the assignment. I’ll be photo’ed with a NDE victim every day. Probably end up on the gossip pages, but that’s what people read.”

Draco was about to comment on the media whore Potter had become when Potter raised his wand once more. Before Draco could react, he muttered a spell and with a wave of his arm, all of Draco’s belongings were swept from their place and into the black garbage bag.

“We’ll talk later,” Potter said. “Let’s go before the morning rush.”

He blinked at Draco now lying spread eagled on the floor, his hospital gown bunched up on his thighs. The heap of sheets and blankets swept aside to yield to his magic chose this moment to fall on Draco’s head.

“Oh. Right,” Draco heard him say. “Should’ve let you keep your pants.”

 

 

Potter saved Draco’s arse from catching pneumonia by giving back his pants and a decent robe to wear. “My place. We’ll figure out our daily routine,” he said as he Apparated them both to the hospital’s entrance, which they had to pass for the hospital to keep records of who’s there and who’s not.

Draco gasped and tried to keep his stomach down. He had never known anyone capable of grabbing someone’s arm and doing a Side-Along without warning, a slowing down of steps, or a frown in preparation for the 3 D’s.

“Are you planning to rule my life for the rest of the month? Do I get a say on anything?”

“No. My job’s to make sure you don’t get killed. By everyone, including me.”

The mannequin was watching them. Potter sighed, let go of Draco’s arm and stepped close to her. “Let us through? Please?”

The mannequin blinked. The window before them remained sealed.

“I’ll be back, promise. I’m an Auror.” Potter’s voice softened.

The mannequin’s eyelids began a wild fluttering sequence, while the blue underneath stared in the slanted, downward tilt. Potter chewed his lips and rubbed his face, apparently at a lost for what to say. “Your, um, bedroom eyes are sexy, I appreciate it, but we’re in a rush. Please.”

It was then the interaction made sense to Draco: even the mannequin was the fangirl of everyone’s favorite Hero. He whipped out the issue of Which Broom? from Potter’s jean pocket, flipped to the Hunk of the Year page and waved it in front of the mannequin. “Miss Mannequin,” he approached her and said. “I understand you’re not a subscriber of the _Prophet_ and I hate to break it to you, but this is his type.” He turned the magazine page to himself and took a look at the athlete. “Not a bad choice, I’d say.”

A faint blush painted Potter’s face. He looked at Draco for a moment, took a breath and leaned in to whisper, “I tried that. She didn’t understand. No gay mannequins, I suppose. Shop window couples are always man and woman.”

Meanwhile, if looks could AK, the mannequin’s stare at Draco could chop him into two. “Look, Miss Mannequin. Your idol here is like your … more colourful colleagues.”

The mannequin’s eyes began to dice Draco into perfectly-sized little cubes.

“Quirky. Outrageous. Eccentric. Sassy. Fierce. Vamped. Flamboyant.”

Draco had been ground up into paste. Potter was wide-eyed, the corner of his lips threatened to lift. “Go on,” he mouthed.

“Sparkly. Pizazz-ty…” The list was dwindling. Draco was proud of his vast vocabulary, but…

Potter interrupted then. He sounded positively victorious when he announced. “I’m like your friends who wear glitter and sequins!”

Just like _Alohomora_ , the words opened the glass window for them.

 

 

 


	2. Noodle Desperado

**~* June, 2002 *~**  

 

> “Here’s the car for the garage and the flowerbeds for the garden. Traveling the Muggle way was a strange experience—the world felt so much larger, packed with sights to see, things to touch. Maybe I have the Ministry to thank for the trip. It wouldn’t have happened if they hadn’t placed me under the international Portkeying restrictions.
> 
> Why can’t we meet? Why do I insist these correspondences be forgotten? Because the public is barely starting to see me as who I am. One photo, one article of you and I together is all that is needed to remind them who I used to be. Nobody would believe we’re no longer on the opposite side—unless, I suppose, the time comes when an Auror stands by me for the sole purpose of keeping me away from harm, and not keeping me under surveillance, when we breathe under one roof for the sake of one common goal.
> 
> Which caption has more appeal—Golden Boy Having Tea with Colourful Interior Designer or War Hero Fraternizing with War Criminal?
> 
> That’s history. I intend to keep it that way.”

 

 

*~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~*

 

**2\. Noodle Desperado**

 

Clockwise stir, three turns. Anticlockwise, four and a half turns. Jiggle the noodles by shaking the fork. Repeat. Jiggle some more.

Draco stared at the empty blue wrapping on the counter again. Batchelor’s Super Noodles, it said and the pasta in the photo was wearing a huge Mexican sombrero, captioned with Mild Mexican Chili. If not for the bright hue, Draco would not be surprised to find something that looked just like that in Borgin and Burkes—as strange and lacking of logic but with an appropriately dire name.

He could visualize a plague in front of the pot:

_Noodle Desperado_

_Prepared by the Hand of Glory_

 

There were no instructions on how to stir or brew the meal on the package. That sachet of bright red powder Potter dumped into the soup and the noodle cake that looked like a clan mummified of flubberworms … Draco would consider eating black beetle eyes over that.

Disgusting.

But the content in the black pot was rapidly coming to resemble food. Potter wasn’t even looking at it—was he really a Potions Genius in disguise? He had focused, instead, on his AccuQuill, recording their conversation so he could write an Auror’s report to the MLE.

“Next question. That’s more for me. I know your day job. What do you do evenings?” Potter put down his quill and parchment and with an incantation, poured his noodles from the skillet to a soup bowl.

Draco hated to admit it, but it smelled wonderful and his stomach growled in agreement. He had, nonetheless, refused it when Potter offered to prepare enough for the two of them.

They sat down on the stools by the kitchen counter, rickety as Draco had suspected. Potter’s flat, located in Muggle London, was tiny and looked nothing like a wizard’s home. Dusty and in chaos, its floor was strewn with stuff—mainly boxes, and other odd objects that had no place in the living room.

Like the pillows.

“You go to pubs?” Harry asked as the soup bowl followed them to the counters.

Draco shook his head. Fish and Chips in the pubs offended his nose’s sensibilities. Plus, the manor was still stocked up with alcohol from the Strip Poker nights during Voldemort’s visit (Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays).

Two forks found their way to Potter and Draco in the meantime, one of which tried to wiggle itself into Draco’s hand. Draco closed his fist and it shoved and shoved into his grip…until Draco relented and let it have its way.

Even Potter’s forks were Gryffindors.

Meanwhile, Potter was nudging his lunch closer to Draco. When Draco finally gave in and picked up a piece of noodle, Potter seemed mesmerized by the bland cream-coloured floor tiles in the kitchen, his downturned face pink from steam. It was after Draco swallowed and reached for another helping, this time a forkful, when he looked at Draco again with a small smile.

“No nightlife? Don’t tell me you go straight to bed,” he said in an almost… sultry? whisper. He’d already put his fork down and was leaning on the counter on one elbow, his head resting against his palm.

The story arc between the two of them had no way to connect the past with this current picture, which was too contradictory, too absurd—Draco was doing whatever Potter said like a meek little sheep, while Potter—

—was sharing food with him, looking at him with The Look, like he was flirting and they were on a date. An ultra-cheap date, mind, but Draco was never picky when it came to people showering him with attention, and with smouldering looks...

Ah, back to Potter’s question. Draco had been taking evening lessons, mostly, having jumped from one hobby to another every few months. A short attention span was not to blame. It was just that inevitably, he’d plunged too fast and too deep into his every new interest and had to pull himself away as quickly afterwards. In the past two years, Draco had tried his hand in the following:

  * learning new languages (failed because he ended up having sexy times with the instructor)
  * drawing and painting (sexy times with the model),
  * sewing and knitting (sexy times with the yarn vendor in Hogsmeade),
  * flower arrangement (sexy times with the patron to whom he had donated his art),
  * … and he had just fled his woodwind lessons before his hospital stay because he’d blown something other than the flute.



“I immerse myself in classics and culture. Ever heard of those, Potter?”

Potter didn’t take Draco’s bait. “Details? Concerts? Museum visits?” he went on to ask, smiling as he Summoned a jar of sweets from the cupboard, found a chocolate frog inside and tore the wrapping. A card with his portrait fell out. He chucked it to the side.

Draco cleared the last piece of noodle and wondered if it was proper Muggle etiquette to drink the soup as well. “I take lessons—music, visual arts, fashion and all that.”

Potter smiled, rummaged his jar of candy and found what was looking for, which he gave to Draco. Lambiel & Sattel swirled in and out of the silver ripples on the wrapper, the name of the finest chocolatiere in Wizarding Switzerland.

“Dessert,” he said simply. “And Draco—” Draco’s name rolled off his tongue like the chocolate in Draco’s mouth, sweet and smooth “—this is from your MLE file: _‘Occasionally, Mr Malfoy lingers in the Hangleton Fairgrounds between six and nine in the evenings. He has had several friends there, the fair harlequin, who speaks no English (d. 1999, dragonpox), the caricature cartoonist, the Wizard who sells Warming Blankets (now in America), the fiddler (now in Thompson’s Travelling Spectacular) and the gardener who weeds and disposes of wilted flowers’ (retired)'_.”

“Then why are you asking me?” Draco forced himself to swallow the chocolate and coughed a little. “And since when is it permissible for law enforcement to spy on innocent citizens?” The way Potter recited his information from memory should have irked him—not so much because of the Ministry’s invasion of his privacy, which he had got used to after the war, but from Potter setting a trap and catching him red-handed in … embellishing the truth. But the same time, knowing that Potter remembered him by heart—

Draco Summoned himself a sweet from Potter’s jar. A chocolate frog flew into his hand and he tore open the wrapping. Dumbledore smiled at him from the inside.

The package fell into the empty soup bowl, which Draco swept off the table by accident and it turned into a moat of white ceramics around his stool. The chocolate frog managed to escape, jumped out of its wrapping and in a few leaps landed in Draco’s hair.

 

 

Potter stood, collected the soup bowl pieces and sent them into the kitchen sink. Sometime in between—Draco could not figure out when, but it could be the moment in which Potter kissed his hair, or rather, picked up the squatting frog with his mouth—Potter had left a small heap of the Swiss chocolates on the counter space before Draco. The scent of these sweets alone was…

Draco was very sensitive to chocolates.

“So those flings with your friends at the fair. Are they true?”

Worse, Draco was severely sensitive to Potter, who was confusing Draco with the questions. Draco wasn’t about to submit himself to this custody setup, not unless he had the upper hand in anything. Everything.

How was Draco going to answer that question? No, so that Potter would call him out as a liar? Or yes, I slept around...

Draco marched into the living room and grabbed the black garbage bag that held his belongings from the hospital. “Forget it. I’m heading back to the Manor. I’d rather have those Death Eater wannabes pay me another visit than playing this little game of yours and the Ministry’s.”

“Not so fast.” A loud _crack!_ split the air and Potter was standing at the doorway of the flat. “We caught a suspect two days ago. He talked. I was checking the facts.”

Draco managed to not trip over the lone slipper caught with a cloth hanger on the floor. “Isn’t that what interrogations are for? I thought the Aurors are experts on that, chaining up whoever doesn’t look right to them on a chair and grill them with questions. I’ve been waiting for the Summons all along—”

He kicked a tube of something on the floor aside. Was that lube?

“—to prove that I’m a conspirator of the other side.” Draco stopped at the door, his face an inch away from Potter’s. “Now move your arse so I can get out and Apparate.”

“I told them I’ll get your answers. I’ll trust you, they’ll trust me. I won’t bring you in.”

For a moment, Draco found himself speechless. It had been no secret that Potter and his friends had been supporters of Shacklebolt’s reforms, one of them being that no one was above the law and deviations from standard protocols, which had been rewritten to protect the rights of the innocent, could be subjected to public hearings. It meant Potter was ready to defend Draco on his behalf.

Either Potter was nuttier than squirrel poo …

Two pieces of chocolate made their way into Potter’s hand from the kitchen counter. He fed himself one, then pushed one against Draco’s lips. Still staring at Potter, Draco let the sweet slip into his mouth.

Or both Potter and Draco were nuttier than squirrel poo.

“And your manor…” mumbling with his mouthful of chocolate, Potter pointed to the other end of his flat. “It’s in my bedroom.”

 

 

Strictly speaking, Potter had lied to Draco because only half of the Malfoy manor was in the flat’s master bedroom. The exterior had remained in Wiltshire, as well as rooms that had once been used to store Dark artefacts and therefore contained additional wards—which, unsurprisingly, made up a substantial part of the manor.

“Hate commutes,” was all Potter offered regarding his reasons to move the manor to his place. After seeing how Potter had spelled some extra space in the guest room to make it his own bedroom—where the pillow and lone slipper and cloth hanger and … the lube went, Draco realized that he could very well be telling the truth. The magic required, daunting for almost everyone else, was a breeze for Harry Potter.

As to how Potter gained access to the manor, the response was, in Potter’s succinct language:

_'Winky married Dobby’s brother whose best friend was the fiancé of Timmy and Timmy’s aunt eloped with Hewey who was the fourth cousin of Zoey and Zoey worked in the neighbouring kitchen of Cissy and Cissy’s hairdresser’s boyfriend was Bobby who delivered mail sometimes to Wiltshire and knew Dewey, your elf.'_

The trouble with house-elves, especially the emancipated varieties, was that they were mates with everyone and were far too easy to bribe. Thought not as keen on receiving clothes since their emancipation, but a nice pair of designer boots could still do them in. And it was no secret that Potter had all the house-elves willing to slave for him.

Draco almost went back to hating Potter right then and there. Especially when a corner of the manor crept through the hinge of the Potter’s bedroom door during their conversation and he just kicked it to squeeze it back in.

He didn’t, however, because he definitely returned to his assessment that Potter was the world’s greatest git when, after some dancing around, Potter’s questions zeroed in on Draco’s private life.

The dancing around, by the way, involved Potter saying, “Gossips say no past marriages, no stable boy or girlfriends, few club sightings. You have a Fairgrounds fetish?”

Potter was either testing Draco’s resistance to awful propositions or trying to annoy him, showcasing just how far his talent in doing so had excelled and matured since they had parted ways in the Great Hall five years ago, when…

Why he cared he didn’t know, but Draco had looked around Potter’s flat to make sure he could find no trace of a significant other.

“As someone in MLE, I expect you to know who are the Fairground types and why I feel comfortable there,” Draco answered with as little emotion he could convey. He had woken Paris again when night fell, when it was all too apparent that it was just him and Potter in the flat. The puppy was exploring every room, the latest spoils from its treasure hunt being Potter’s Auror badge.

Potter, seated cross-legged on the carpet and taking notes, smiled faintly and Summoned his badge from the plush animal. “No, Paris,” he shook his head at the puppy. Without turning back to look at Draco, he said, “Fairground types? Pure-bloods, gambled on the wrong side of the war and lost everything. No shops hire them. They are like gypsies—come and go, hard to track down.”

“Close enough.,” Draco sat back in the small sofa, rested his hands behind his head and stretched. Paris snuggled for a second in his lap and took off again. “Potter, which side would you say I’m on? Yours or theirs?”

“Their side,” Potter said without hesitation.

True, maybe. But Draco realized that it wasn’t what he had expected to hear.

“Would you clarify?”

His face must have given away his emotions—emotions that Draco had no way of articulating. Potter let the silence seethe between them, his intensified gaze focused on Draco as he brushed the feather of his quill against his lips.

Potter didn’t answer. Instead, he said, “Your background, your history are very close to the Fairground folks’ and there’re no one else in your life but them. They’re your mates. Still, when I said you’re on their side, you hate it.”

“I thought you mean the NDEs.”

“I didn’t mention them.”

“You implied.”

“You assumed I implied.”

“Your point?”

“No point.” Paris bounced back, this time with a key. Potter picked it up and the puppy struggled in his arms. “Getting your thoughts on things. Helps me prepare for trouble.”

From the nonchalant manner he’d said it, Potter could have said Going to the library. Helps me prepare for tomorrow’s test.

“You’re expecting trouble?” Paris escaped Potter’s hold, jumped into Draco’s arms and handed over Potter’s key, its soft barks demanding attention—and praise—for its successful mission.

“With NDEs? No, not with me around.” Presumptuous, but Draco believed him. “With you? Yes.”

“So much for trust and I promise, I won’t disappoint.” Draco took the key from the puppy and was about to throw it back at their owner when Potter shook his head.

“Keep it with you,” he said. “Backup.”

 

 

They had chatted a bit after dinner and had a glass of wine. The conversation was cordial and impersonal, their exchanges ranging from Quidditch to weather to Honeyduke’s new products. The Goblin War romance in Draco’s head was almost complete when bedtime came, with Hodrod the Horny-Handed victorious over Urg the Unclean this time, and the Speccy One saving the blond… Princess. Perhaps it was the last moment of calm before the storm—Potter would follow Draco to his work sites starting tomorrow morning.

“I never dared to ask,” Draco asked before retreating into the manor, into his bedroom … in Potter’s bedroom. “Just how closely are you going to watch me?”

“Depends.” With a Nox, Potter spelled away the light from the last glowing table lamp. Draco had no idea what expression was on Potter’s face when his voice rang lightly in the pitch darkness of the living room. “Let’s say, if a stranger enters your bedroom, I’ll know what happens… in every detail.”

 

 

Half an hour later, Draco crumpled up the empty pink wrapper, the package of a tiny but decadent piece of Sweet Dreams cocoa bar that, no doubt, has been a gift from Potter. The rich taste of chocolate lingered in Draco’s mouth, yet to turn sour or bitter like that of worse quality chocolates—which basically was chocolate of any kind.

Spineless and his eyelids feeling heavier by the minute, Draco slumped back on the bed and used the pink foil to wipe his stomach dry.

He wondered if Potter knew what’d just happened under his roof.

 

 

 


	3. Rad Bromance, Bad Romance

**~* June, 2001 *~**  

 

> “Consider the closets congratulatory gifts for your clothes. They have much more space to flaunt their atrocity now that you’re out of their space.
> 
> The worst you’ll get in the next few days is a verbal jab or two and a few gay jokes, mostly from Muggleborns. If you want a good comeback or two for emergencies, say so in your thank you owl, which I’ve told you it isn’t necessary but you’ll send anyway (along with enough sweets to turn me into Gregory Goyle).
> 
> I can help you there.
> 
> PS. Only Muggles would evoke the name of the God of War on a chocolate bar with gooey filling.”

 

 

*~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~*

 

**3\. Rad Bromance, Bad Romance**

 

“Shut up!”

When the noise refused to drop even a single notch. Draco fired his wand into the air, a yellow beam shooting towards the ceiling.

Finally, a few witches looked up and away from Potter the Superstar.

“What is that?” One asked.

“A screaming mouth with funny-looking teeth,” Two answered with authority.

“I don’t see it,” Three chimed in.

“Yellow teeth, bigger teeth at the bottom?” Two leered at Three.

“No one’s got teeth like that,” Three said, indignant.

“But…” One was still staring.

“No ‘but’s, my Uncle’s teeth look the same!”

“Batman! You know Batman?” Potter was beaming at Draco. He had cast a Sonorous on himself and Draco kicked himself for forgetting to do the same.

On second thought, the spell was popular only among lowly street vendors and overexcited Quidditch announcers. Malfoys were much, much above it.

As for Batman, Draco did have some knowledge of Muggle culture, thank you very much. Especially when Gotham in New York was the equivalent of the Diagon-Knockturn district in London, only with more Muggle influence, more circuses and tailors with bad enough taste to consider pants part of street attire. The distress signal from the police department wasn’t a searchlight with a bat stencil stuck on it. It came from a spell that was the predecessor of Morsmordre (for details, please consult _1001 Wizarding Trivia, 238th Edition_ , available from the Malfoy archives for five sickles a day).

The Dark Lord was bloody powerful and awe-inspiring, but a creative soul he was not—not the one-seventh that had resided in his own body anyway. The only thing remotely artistic about Voldemort was his stick figure drawings, which a time or two he’d left on his Mudblood-to-torture lists. These drawings Draco had auctioned off in WCove, a Sunday stall in the Fairgrounds. The Galleons he had collected was sufficient for Draco to start this business.

In case there were any doubts, Draco Malfoy was a self-made man. He still lived in the manor, which was, after all, his ancestral home, but had refrained from spending a Knut from his family’s Gringotts vault since the war. There had been a bit of a media discussion right after the auction, of the ethics surrounding the trade of an artwork known as _Voldemort Goes to the Park, Plays Swing and Says ‘WEEEEEE!’_ for monetary gains.

Draco had endured a few Howlers at that time, especially after his guest appearance on the WWN news show. But he’d also gained respect. Not until after that interview could Draco walk on the streets without being jeered at.

Speaking of his one-wizard interior design company, Draco had Apparated Potter and himself to the home of his client of the day, Mrs Beech, whose home was one of the many houses squeezed in the northeast corner of Spinner’s End. Draco had been in the town before, of course, but that was before it’d been burnt down during the war. The cottage that had once been Severus Snape’s residence was now the Town Hall, with a lone statue inside to commemorate the former Potions Master.

Taking a photo of the statue, as Draco had once attempted to do, cost eight knuts and five sickles, enough to buy two Glumbumble Treacles.

So Draco had bought a breeding pair of the flying insects instead, which had since made tons of babies, spreading melancholy all over Britain.

Snape would have approved. What he would _not_ have approved was what his hometown had become. Not a slum, which at least had character, like the sinister gargoyles on the stone arches in Knockturn Alley, but something of a Muggle suburb with identical looking cottages, each the same picket fence surrounding its one-sized front and back yards. The outer walls were all painted a dark beige hue that matched the uniformly tanned skin tone of the witches who resided there, who had nothing to do but to prove whose husband rode a bigger broomstick, or redesign the interior of their homes for the billionth time, or make novel use of the architectural spells, clearly neglected by the planners of the town, for the magnificent (re)constructions of their bosoms, or—

—or fawn over Harry Potter, taking pictures with him, asking him for autographs and literally throwing themselves into his arms.

Potter had been friendly and compliant, smiling as he greeted his fans who had come from all over town as the news of his appearance spread.

Meanwhile, Draco had to function amidst the noise, the camera flashes and more than several dizzy spells among their audience. He had removed the protective charms on the unwanted furniture and was preparing to reshape them into new designs—designs that were as tasteless as the ones before. The combination of yellow gold and streeler shells, which changed its appearance like a kaleidoscope every hour, made for a horrifying theme, although it did match the rather … colourful personality of the owner, Mrs. Beech, whose surname Draco had already conveniently mispronounced.

Only Potter had caught Draco’s deliberate shortening of the vowel and had thrown Draco a knowing smile, which made Draco want to…

Well. Never mind that. What was important—and unbeknownst to Draco until this morning—was that the WWN was there to record the makeover of Mrs Beech’s home, to be broadcast in Episode 3 of The Figuratively Real but Literally A Bit Plastic HouseWitch of Spinner’s End (the show’s name had come about in the dawn of the Ministry’s post war Truthful Reporting policy).

The media presence would reveal Draco as responsible for executing this nightmare of a design.

It would also provide an opportunity for Potter to talk to the whole Wizarding Britain, explaining why he’d been there with Draco and why Neo Death Eaters were serious threats to the new found peace. It was a brief question, why Potter was there, because most of the questions were devoted to topics such as what brand Potter was wearing (Polo and Levi’s) and who gave him the new ring on his finger (Shacklebolt. All Aurors would get one as a communication device). But he got his point across to the majority of commoners within the first hour of his assignment, and as far as publicity was concerned, this strategy would be far more effective than appearing on the headlines of the _Prophet_ ’s Politics Page.

Potter was no Hufflepuff. He had to know about the filming and was feigning innocence when he’d asked Draco where they’d be going this morning. Didn’t Potter’s old flame Ginervra Weasley host a talk show on the WWN?

Draco grabbed a piece of chocolate from his pocket, blew away the anti-melting spell that coated the sweet and popped it in his mouth, while spelling the frame of the living room mirror to change from magenta to gold. The extra spell he placed on the mirror afterwards was … a gift.

The filming crew was about to leave. As they pushed through the throngs of neighbours crowded by the front door to worship Potter, someone managed to squeeze in the last question. “Are there any sparks, shall we say, between you and your charge? Mr Malfoy, after all, used to be a Death—”

“No sparks between us.” Potter cut her off with a chuckle.

Potter hadn’t grown much in the past few years, Draco had once thought, but now he wondered if Potter’s growth had all gone to his skin—to its thickening, that was. He didn’t expect Potter to say anymore, but then he heard:

“Chocolates, maybe. We share chocolates.”

Even more unexpected for Draco was the reflection in the mirror before him. His own face, which looked to belong to a body a few stones heavier than he truly was— thanks to the “gift” spell he had cast—struggled for a while before giving in, and lit up with what could only be described as Potter’s grin.

 

 

The allegedly, figuratively real housewitch threw her neighbours out of her house even before the Apparition crack! of the WWN crew had subsided. Soon she was sprawling on the sofa in her designer robe, her tanned, long legs bent like a frog’s as she drank from the bottle of Firewhiskey in her manicured hand. Her cleaning wand was slaving away in the entrance hall, spelling off the footprints and the dust bunnies caught in the neon-green carpet and sneezing up a spray to freshen the air.

“You knew about the WWN programme,” Draco said as soon as Potter followed him into the bedroom.

Potter shrugged. “Everyone’s heard of TFRBLABPHWOTSE.”

“You knew they were here today.”

Potter shrugged again, a telling twinkle in his eyes.

“Now everyone will know of me as the designer who creates atrocious furniture.”

“Now everyone will remember you as the Pure-blood who really earns his living.”

“My work here may be seen as reflective of my taste. Few would know or care that for this contract I’m limited to carrying out the Beech’s design.” Draco waved at the bedside lamp he had just worked on. The streeler shell lampshade switched its appearance to a riot of red and pink polka dots on yellow. “What if people think I, Draco Malfoy, am into gold and rainbows, like a leprechaun?”

Potter tilted his head, an amused curve on his lips. “Draco, you dress like a widow.”

“And who, by the way, granted you permission to call me by my given name?” Draco waved his wand at the bedside table, which shuddered as its invisible protective shell melted away, but then its surface started to blister and rain chipped paint the wooden floor. “This table is rubbish,” he mumbled. No way it’ll withstand another Transformation.”

“Sorry to hear, Draco.” Potter sounded not the least apologetic when he emphasized the word “Draco” with a grin.

“Nothing to be sorry about.” Draco wasn’t sure whether his own statement was referring to the furniture or the use of his given name. He cleaned up the paint dust and smirked. “I’ll order a new table and charge her a hefty fee for owling and levitating. And this old one I have to Banish before I work on the floor. Another item on the charge…”

The table faded into a shadow and left the world before Draco could complete his thought. Potter’s wand had made less than a victorious twirl in his hand when miscellaneous objects, hidden inside the drawers before, re-materialized as outlines in the air, then fell and crashed against the floor.

Potter lifted his eyebrows and emitted a snicker. “Sorry,” he said again.

“Gryffindor.” Draco threw him a narrowed-eye glance. “Acting before thinking.” Potter knew nothing about it, of course, but the Banishing charm used by designerwizards was a variant of the standard; it would build an enclosed space to hold the loose content of the furniture before dissolving the shell by magic.

Not that Draco had the chance to lecture Potter any further, because lying on the floor between them, the outlines having turned solid and real, was a heap of …

A few bent their necks, looked at Potter and Draco, and squirmed.

“That’s…” Potter began.

Draco was certain Potter would say something unnecessary, such as the obvious ( _“…a lot of anal plugs!”_ ), something Gryffindorish ( _“…an impressive collection!”_ ) or the truth ( _“…embarrassing”_ ).

Instead, after the pause Potter followed up with “Mr Beech’s table. No wonder she’s drinking.”

Draco had not considered that. The spectacular view before them did little to faze him. Having visited no shortage of homes with interior décor ranging from yawn-inducing to heart attack worthy, one thing he had learned was certain as the fact that Malfoy looks were gifts from the gods—the bedside table was a haven for dildos and other phallic objects.

It was not, as Draco had first believed, a storage for healthy midnight snack collections of cucumbers and courgettes.

Life in the manor was lonely. Contrary to common belief, Draco would never consider running a potions lab at home due to safety hazards (fire, flood, escaped potions ingredients), environmental regulations (no Giant Squid nearby to feed on the cauldron dregs) and more than anything else, the smells that refused to go away. Professor Snape had kept his hair greasy over the years just so his nose had only had to desensitize one kind of stench. Draco was not about to ruin his social life—or whatever remained of it—so while he had followed the footsteps of his forefathers and become an extracurricular scholar to kill time, he’d elected Phallistry to be his subject of choice.

Aside from the usual too short too long too hard too soft too straight too curved too fat too thin observations, there were magical attributes to consider in the tools of the trade—how much they wriggled and poked, where and how strong etc etc. He’d had made a chart of his experimental data somewhere, but the last time he’d come by it …

Potter gave his wand a sheepish wave and moved the heap of toys onto the bed. Just before it landed he spotted a banana, its skin more black than yellow and falling apart. His reflex, perhaps, propelled him to pull it away from the pile.

It landed on the floor with a splat, which Potter promptly stepped on and slipped.

The consequence was this: one Harry Potter, fallen face flat on the bed, padded by a sea of anal plugs. He laughed, rolling onto his back and stretching and writhing as he muttered “ticklish” under his gasps. The magical plugs—those with Gaydar Inside ®—sensed the lithe body undulating over them (as supposed to Mr Beech’s, which made Slughorn’s body look like the epitome of athletic grace) and worked even harder, twirling and poking and stretching…

And all Draco could think of, if he could still think, was this: he needed more chocolate RIGHT NOW, especially when he’d just remembered that the last time he’d seen his experiment list, he’d been writing his mother and grabbed a random piece of parchment to jot down an extra thought.

On that note, a cocoa forest dedicated for Draco’s consumption would do. Barely.

Draco must be staring for he didn’t know how long. When he came about, Potter had swept the ticklish toys aside and was looking back at him, waiting for Draco to emerge from his trance. He looked … hopeful, blinking and chewing his lower lip.

Encouraged, perhaps, by Draco’s lack of speech, Potter’s hand—the one free of his wand—proceeded to crawl on the mattress, patted and found the closest anal plug lying beside him. His eyes never leaving Draco, Potter closed his hand around the plug—a Muggle one with a girth too wide—and slipped his palm along its length…

… and pulled. Once. Twice. Three times. By the fourth time, his hips gave a small but noticeable thrust.

Draco might have let out a whimper, which he might have silenced by grabbing a palmful of chocolate from his pocket and stuffed them all into his mouth at once.

They stayed on his tongue like hard candy with their anti-melting coating intact—Draco had forgotten to blow them off.

And the sweets were not the only thing on Draco that was hard and wished to be blown.

Saying that the grin appearing on Potter’s face was wide enough to brighten the room was a gross understatement. It could bring that rotten, mashed banana back to life—not that it had died in vain, considering the view Draco’s eyes were feasting on. Its sacrifice was worthy of an Order of Merlin...

Harry reached out to Draco with one arm. “Help me up?”

As soon as Draco’s hand closed around Potter’s, Potter yanked Draco downward and Draco tumbled on the bed, his back landing beside Potter and upon the toys. Potter rolled over and pressed him down with his body weight, while Draco attempted to shriek with his mouthful of chocolate as the toys went on a conga party below him, sensing the two wizards wrestling above them.

“Now we’re even,” Potter whispered with a mock triumphant squint. “In case you blackmail me with what you just saw.”

Draco’s indignant _Hmmpphbrfummmmhh!!_ voiced his outrage.

Potter laughed, then cupped Draco’s face with his hands. Draco could do little about it with Potter’s weight on him…

… and Potter’s touch on his skin…

…and Potter’s lower body—

“Open your mouth,” Potter said to him. It was not a request.

The ever trustworthy Malfoy pride kicked in and kept Draco’s lips in a tight seal.

“You’ll choke, then die.” Potter’s face inched even closer, his eyes looking at Draco as if Draco was a prey, the little rat a cat would play with until its death. “Can’t have that. I’ll have to write it up. _‘Deceased Ministry charge Draco Malfoy, found on a bed with anal plugs. Cause of death, choking on hard_ …’”

What other options did Draco have?

Potter smiled when Draco opened his mouth just a little. Then he closed in, the warmth and moisture from his breath no longer distinguishable from Draco’s own. His lips puckered, not enough to touch Draco’s but just enough to blow a soft breeze into Draco’s mouth.

The chocolate softened. It rich decadence flowed upon Draco’s tongue.

Potter blew again and again, until all the chocolate had melted.

Until Draco had melted—he felt spineless, the pride that was his marrow, his soul replaced by a pile of goo.

Sweet, enticing goo. A little bitterness at first, but that was all but gone in the aftertaste.

“There,” Potter pulled away and sat up. He was still straddling Draco’s thighs when a thoroughly drunk Mrs Beech appeared at the doorway. She staggered into the bedroom, burping while Potter managed to scramble off the bed, his jeans looking even tighter as its crotch area took up extra fabric.

The toys on the bed had stilled in her presence. Some were trying to roll under the pillow. The…organic ones piled themselves on top of one another to look like a salad. Mrs Beech frowned and then with a wild fling of her wand, shoved the toys on to the floor.

“Gay!!” She wailed. “Gay! Gay! Gay! Is there one wizard in this goddamn world who’s straight?”

 

 

“It’s not the same as being gay, Potter. Sleeping with both wizards and witches is bisexual.”

“Isn’t straight.”

“But they have no qualms against procreation. Functionally, they are classified as straight. Don’t argue with me. It’s a consensus among the Wizarding academia, of which the Malfoy family is a proud member for centuries, sponsored by the generous donations from Cinderella’s Pumpkin Juice Company, the choice for wizards thirsty for knowledge, and Quality Quidditch Supplies, the official gear supplier of the 2000 Quidditch World Cup and…”

“No.”

“Fine. Act like a git, Potter. It doesn’t make a difference to the list of people Arthur and Molly Weasley have slept with.”

“Don’t. Remind. Me. Again.”

Lucky for them, Mrs Beech had fallen into a stupor right after she had asked the question that would lead to this debate, which took place as the two of them took a short walk along the river in Spinner’s End. Draco had suggested casting an Obliviate on her but Potter had spoken against it, claiming that she would not remember a thing at her state anyway and a broken memory might tempt her to try to recall what had happened.

Potter won another round. Hardly surprising, that.

As an apology to her life’s woes, perhaps, Draco had ordered a new bedside table for the Beech residence for free (owling and levitating fees still applied) and Potter had replaced the expired banana with a fresh one, to which he had added extra features like speed control and a lube dispenser in the core while Draco did his work. It was a wonder that Draco managed to finish his job before sunset, with Potter fondling a banana a few meters away from him.

“So there’s no wizard in this goddamn world who’s straight.” Potter said, looking pensive. Hands inserted in his jeans pockets, he stopped and turned towards the water to welcome the evening breeze.

“No, if we must go by your ridiculous, hairsplitting definition.” As he talked, Draco could feel long hair taking off in the wind, sweeping to the side where Potter stood. He combed it with his fingers and pulled it backwards, wondering if Potter had felt the ends brushing against his face. After Summoning a ribbon, Draco was about to tie his hair up when Potter, his gaze never leaving the water, said:

“Leave it down.”

It took Draco a moment to figure out what Potter had meant. Another breeze swept by, bringing in the scent of summer grass and wild flowers, a scent that had no place in an artificial town like Spinner’s End. “May I remind you, Potter, that we haven’t seen each other for years prior to yesterday. Your official duty here is to protect me, or more appropriately, it seems, to use me for the Ministry’s propaganda. You can’t mouth off commands and expect to get what you want—I’m not a criminal to your Auror.” Draco took a breath. “You hardly know…”

His next word was meant to be a simple ‘me’, but no matter how hard he tried, it refused to roll off his tongue.

Potter’s looking at Draco pushed what was already difficult into the realm of impossibility.

What ended up tumbling out of Draco’s mouth was this: “You hardly know hairstyles.”

What? Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. But Potter showed no intent to tease, didn’t even smile at Draco’s words. Instead, he thought for a moment and replied, his voice soft as the summer’s wind. “Your hair has always looked like this. Flies the way the wind blows. And all of this, Draco,—” His hand gestured a wave around him “—is the present to me. Including you… your hair.” He chuckled then. “History bores me to sleep.”

“Your history didn’t have enough excitement?”

“Exciting, but written by someone else. You understand that.” Potter rotated his body around and leaned against the railing behind him. “So yeah, our history is obsolete. The thing I’ll keep in my book,” a smile developing, he threw Draco one last glance before resuming his walk down the pavement, “is that Auror or not, Harry Potter owns Draco Malfoy.”

Draco picked up his steps to catch up, but Potter’s behind… was a sight to behold. A distraction. Not only was there the tight arse in the tight jeans, but there were his shoulders, broad for his petit frame, the sleeves of his shirt flapping in a carefree manner in the breeze, the way the evening sun flowing in his wild hair—streaks of light making its way into the dark.

“What about the other way around?” Draco shouted against the wind. “What about I, Draco Malfoy, owning your arse, Harry Potter?”

Potter turned, keeping his pace as he walked backwards with his hands still in his pocket.

“Fine by me,” he said.

 

 

 


	4. Can You Dance like a Hippogriff?

**~* January, 2001 *~**

 

> “Furniture for the living and dining rooms. Careful of the cuckoo clock: it’s fragile. Do not expect it to run, even if you may see the time magic oiling the cogwheels. It never will.”

 

 

*~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~*

 

**4\. Can You Dance like a Hippogriff?**

 

Almost two weeks had flown by since the start of Potter’s assignment. Draco had got used to doing his day job with Potter trailing him, not as much as his bodyguard—there weren’t much to guard against unless Potter’s fanwitches were considered threats—but as his helper. A competent one too, for after that first day at the Beech’s, Potter had had no more incidents with phallic objects in the bedroom.

Which was perhaps—just perhaps—a bit to Draco’s dismay.

Meanwhile, the last remaining blemishes on Draco’s face had vanished, thanks to a skin lotion Potter had shoved into his hands, purchased from a shop called Tesco and used on his lightning bolt in his Hogwarts years.

Sometimes, Draco forgot why Potter was there in his life. Sometimes, Potter had to mention the NDEs to remind him.

Sometimes, for reasons Draco had no interest to contemplate, it irked him when Potter did that.

As of this week, MLE’s investigations into his case had pretty much excluded the possibility that the wizards behind Draco’s attack had any organized backing. They’d seemed to be a small band of extremists who’d acted on their whim, a threat much smaller than what was once believed to be.

Draco wondered if his protective custody would be cut short. If cutting short would be a blessing for them or a curse. Their conversations remained awkward, worsened by Potter’s habit of butchering his sentences. Proper communication only happened during Draco’s work hours, when their dialogues had something to focus on other than themselves.

Other times, the two of them ended up exchanging more chocolate. Somehow, the sweets they unwrapped always found their way in the other’s mouth—a mutual agreement to shut each another up, Draco surmised, to make sure they had no way of saying things that would clear the confusion between them.

The confusion that was them.

Potter’s hand reached for Draco’s hair, looped the tresses around its fingers and let it fall back into place. Draco could only imagine how they looked, him sitting on the carpet, his back leaning against the sofa on which Potter was lounging on his back. The silence, the peace between them had stretched long enough that Paris had slipped back to its idle mode on Draco’s lap.

Of course, Draco could have retreated into his quarters in Potter’s bedroom right after dinner.

He could also have read a book take a bath walk the puppy stare at the ceiling foster self-love in front of the mirror… so on, so forth.

The key phrase was ‘could have’.

“You won’t go to the Fairgrounds when I’m around. Am I right?” Potter asked, his voice muffled with repose on this Friday evening.

Draco lolled his head to look at Potter, whose T-shirt had bunched up on his stomach, a flat plane of muscles on which lay chocolate wrappings. Potter let go of the few strands of Draco’s hair he still had in his hand; they flowed along the curve of Potter’s abdomen, down towards his hips.

“I don’t have a reason to go these days.” Draco swallowed and went back to staring straight before him. “My teacher’s probably left London. They never stay long.”

“What lessons?”

“You already know, Potter. You and your stalker-minions in the Ministry.”

Potter shifted. To lie on his side, Draco presumed. Silver foils showered the carpet beside him.

“Can’t remember the last ones were drawing or music. You miss them?”

For a moment, the question hung in the air. Draco knew ‘them’ could mean many things—the lessons, the people, the flings, the tattered remains of Draco’s world before the war. Draco shrugged, the most non-committal response he could offer. They had come home straight from Draco’s work for the past week and Draco did miss the Fairgrounds, where he was neither the ex Death Eater nor the Reformed Wizard. Even his blond hair was unremarkable over there—not when the clowns were Levitating a dozen neon batons over their heads.

“We’ll go tomorrow.”

“The grounds are public. As for the living quarters—that’s where I have my lessons—” Draco shook his head, “—I doubt the folks there will be delighted to see you.”

“They will. I’ll make a fool of myself.” Chuckling lightly, Potter leaned forward as he coiled up on the sofa. The curve of his body formed a perfect alcove for Draco’s head to fall back, to feel the heat radiating from his abdomen to linger on and caress Draco’s neck. “Dance lessons. A dance troupe is in town.”

 

 

The Fairgrounds was built upon a piece of wasteland north of Great Hangleton, from which the Muggles had been scared away by Voldemort’s followers during the Second War. Location wise, it was symmetric—with reference to the town centre—to the cemetery of the abandoned town church where Voldemort had been buried. The remains of the Dark Lord could enjoy the midnight fireworks from the Fairgrounds every summer evening.

None of this information was official announcement, but the public was well aware of it—if not through the rumours, stoked by the loose tongue of town officials, then certainly from the new sign that said _Hangletons: The Darkest Place on Earth_. The Malfoys had been notified of the Dark Lord’s burial site only because Draco’s mother had named Tom Marvolo Riddle her kin—specifically, her brother-in-law-but-not-really, given that her sister Bellatrix had only been legally married to Rodolphus LeStrange.

It must have been hard, playing second fiddle, but Uncle LeStrange had had very delicate skin and the Dark Lord, who's scaly and not so much oily as slimy, was no competition. If Draco had been a better wizard, he would have offered his night cream back when the Dark Lord was his manor mate—and hence saved himself from the trauma of waking up to the sight of a scaly and slimy … thing thieving it from his bedroom.

But it’d made perfect sense then, why the Dark Lord had limited his public appearances to night time. Darkness had a way of hiding flaws, the scars and blemishes.

Which also explained why Draco only visited the Fairgrounds in the evenings.

Under the sun, the place was shabby and atrocious with its Hufflepuffian paint. Under the black skies, his eyes were either too weak to capture the ugliness, or too blinded by the intense, sparkly lights all over the place to make out any details.

And this evening, Draco was extra thankful for the night because he had in tow one Mr Harry Potter, who happened to be high on the fizzy Butterbeer served all over the entertainment park.

“You’re supposed to Levitate your cup and move it under the spray, not stand underneath it with the cup in your hand.” Draco grabbed Potter’s sticky forearm to hustle him along. “Has anyone ever taught you how to use a Soda Fountain?”

Potter stared at him for a moment. “No,” he replied finally and burst into giggles before taking another sip of his drink. “The Butterbeer’s spiked with something.” He closed an eye and squinted into the golden liquid. “I think.”

Of course it was. How else could the Fairgrounds owners entice wizards and witches to spend more Galleons than they should in the Pensieve Shops, where they could frame a memory and take it home? “Then why are you still drinking? You’re on duty, Auror Potter. A NDE can Apparate before us and strike at any moment,—” Would the attacker look like Urg the Unclean? Or Hodrod the Horny-handed? Would The Speccy One save Draco from the dirty and the horny? Or was The Speccy One himself dir… “—especially given we’re at the heart of the Darkest Place on Earth.”

“I know,” Potter said, his giggles yielding to a solemn expression—hardened eyes, thinned lips and all. Just as Draco began to wonder if Potter had been struck with some epiphany, Potter raised his arm into the air and cried, “Constant vigilance!”

The contents of the cup in his hand rained all over both Draco and himself.

They’d reached the end of the main road, to the corner of the Fairgrounds that was, perhaps, Draco’s favourite spot. A giant clock stood there, backed by a cast iron column adorned with motives of burning phoenixes and slithering serpents. Its face was almost three times Draco’s height, its pewter frame glowed in the cold white of the phoenix flames rather than the wild, cheap hues found in the rest of the grounds.

Potter stood and studied the clock. Draco must have stared at it as well, even if he had been in the same spot countless times, for he noticed that Potter had Scourgified them both and he had not a clue when the spell had been cast.

Before them, the longest hand paced steadily backwards, second by second. The minutes hand raced past it, also spinning counter clockwise. The hours hand was pointing at twelve, as it’d been ever since Draco had taken the first look at the clock. As always, too, it jittered in an apparent attempt to move—forward—but was frozen against will in its place, held back by the minutes and seconds hands that refused to let it go.

“Who made this?” Potter asked.

Draco felt air rushing into his chest. Alexei had long since left Britain, but should an Auror know about him, whose family name was enough in the eyes of many to be an offence?

“Someone I know here,” he replied. “Someone who’d been trained as a sculptor and ended up making stage props for the fair shows. He…”

Or, should Potter know about Draco’s friend, a wizard who’d drifted away from Draco’s life like so many before and after him?

Another deep draw of breath was what it took to make a decision—Draco had assumed it would be far more difficult than that, maybe because he had never taken into account the possibility of Potter watching him with a look of such attentiveness. Such care.

“He, Alexei, belonged to a family of artists in Estonia. Purebloods, but they’re not on either side in our war, the only connection they had with the Dark… Voldemort was his uncle had designed the Death Eater mask, not that he’d had any knowledge of it at the time. Voldemort…borrowed the design after seeing it in the Carnevale di Venezia.” A call that Draco’s father had deemed worthy of celebration, he’d told Draco when he’s shared this story, given the design before—one that the Dark Lord could well have stolen as well—had involved some cucumber slice looking motif around the eyes. “And since you’ll ask, I’ll add that yes, Alexei was the one who gave me… art lessons.”

To that response Potter said nothing, although his eyes flickered towards Draco for a moment and there was a glint in them—whether it was from the reflection on his glasses or something in his mind, Draco could not be sure. Potter then went about to poke the root of the hour hand, which he could only reach with the tip of his raised wand.

“Has the hour hand ever moved?”

“No. The time magic was bust from the very start.”

“You saw it built?”

“You can say that.” Draco bit his tongue to bar himself from further elaboration. Would it count as seeing it built if he had been… entangled by arms and legs and hair with the artist—as friends with benefits—in the poor excuse of a workshop backstage, where Alexei had honed his craft after hours? Would it count if, in the golden light of the iron being cast by his side, Draco’d gasped a name that had not been Alexei’s when he’d come, which had lent itself to a night of story telling, which had lent itself to the phoenix and serpent motif on the pillar behind the clock?

Would it count if he’d been the one to cast the doomed _Tempus_?

“We—that would be Alexei, I, and people who I’ve known afterwards—have all tried to fix the hour hand but…” Draco shook his head. “The sculpture’s stayed here for a reason. No one wants to buy a timepiece that goes backwards. The management reckoned it’s something to fill up space, as long as we’d donate it to the Fairgrounds for free.”

Potter approached the clock, his face lit by the phoenix fire and his hair swept sideways by the breeze from the moving clock hands. His gaze was diffused with the Butterbeer in his system, the intensity replaced with a certain kind of… innocence. “It’s interesting. Like a clock to the past.”

“Except the hour hand stalls.”

“Except that.” Potter turned towards Draco, shrugged and smiled. “But it can’t go both ways. Either forward or backward.”

Draco was about to ask Potter how he would go about its repair, but the shout of “Sonorous Testing!” could be heard from the centre stage of the Fairgrounds, followed by the cacophonous squeaks as the violins did their warm up stretches in preparation for the show.

“We’ll be back.” Potter grabbed Draco’s arm. “Let’s go.”

 

 

The dance troupe was competent, the fiddlers played their music well enough and the stage props popped in and faded at the right moments. The expanded space in front of the stage managed to accommodate the crowd, which was large enough to lift the spirits of the performers but not enough to instigate rowdy behaviour.

There was only one problem.

You see, Draco Malfoy wasn’t the type accustomed to second-handed possessions. His clothes were tailor-made. He’d made every piece of furniture anew when he’d remodelled the manor. His only experience of using something with a previous owner—his mum’s wand—had been a short-lived, not to mention disastrous, experience.

Thus the second-handed embarrassment of watching Potter dance … Draco Malfoy reckoned he’d be scarred from the experience for life. Whoever had come up with the saying _Dance Like No One Was Watching_ should be bound to a chair by _Incarcerous_ , draped with Potter’s infamous Invisibility Cloak and forced to relive the horror before Draco’s eyes.

Even better, he should be required to learn Potter’s dance moves—and Draco was using that term in its most liberal sense—and perform them on WWN. Or for the inmates of Azkaban.

Potter had apparently taken to heart the hit song from their school years _Can You Dance Like a Hippogriff_ , for that was exactly the way he danced—no, not like a hippogriff (the title of the song was pre-war and therefore, misleading), but rather, a charade to the index of _Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them_. In other words, Potter flailed with the grace of a troll, the lines of a leprechaun and the rhythm of a Boggart in pain, and Draco was the one who felt like the hippogriff beside him, wanting to fly off from the cliff and not as much swoop down to the ground than to bury himself under it.

The crowd had noticed them. Rather than putting to a stop to such a crime against wizardry, they laughed and opened up a space in the middle for their hero to show off his nimble (spasmodic) feet. And Potter, the Hogwarts Champion who had looked as comfortable as a Dementor in heat in their 4th year dance, took on the challenge with his classic Gryffindor … qualities.

Meanwhile, Draco shrunk to the edge of the circle and tried to, rather unsuccessfully, become one with the stage curtains. No such luck, for almost everyone had seen the latest episode of TFRBLABPHWOTSE and knew that Potter and Draco would be seen together for the next few weeks—and for the few who had somehow managed to miss the show, they would have either seen A) the photo of the two of them stepping out of Potter’s flat together, published in the latest issue of every gossip rag out there or B) the advertisement for the hottest and most haphazardly made release from Wicked Wand of Destiny productions, _Henry Pooter and the Malfunctional Dragon Ride_.

Sympathy for Draco’s woes was next to non-existent. “How much did Harry drink?” An old wizard asked Draco with a look of concern, one among the very few that Draco had garnered from the crowd (And Harry? Who was he to be on a first name basis with The Embarrassment Who Refused to Go Away?). What Draco had received far more was the eye narrowing from the dance troupe members on the stage. Potter was stealing their thunder.

At least, Draco could use that as an excuse to keep Potter out of the living quarters, should he ask again later in the name of letting Draco visit his friends.

The crowd became wilder as the evening wore on, perhaps due to the Butterbeer they were all imbibing to quench their thirst. When the dance troupe retreated backstage and its audience subsided, Draco found himself wrapped in the arms of a very sweaty Potter, who had draped his body on Draco’s back with a goofy grin on his face. In his hand was another cup of Butterbeer, fresh from the fountain sprouting beside the stage.

“There’re no bodyguards worst than you. Ever.” Draco pulled himself away from Potter’s embrace. “Goyle is a bona fide Head Auror compared to you.”

“You weren’t dancing.” Potter stood boneless for a second and collapsed on Draco again.

“You weren’t, either, but I’ll give you full marks for your imitation of someone under _Cruciatus_. It’s flawless.”

Potter’s chin was resting on Draco’s shoulder. His hair looked almost tidy for once, tamed by the dampness of his sweat. He tilted his head and his breath, sweet and warm, tickled Draco’s ear. “Thought you’d sneaked off to see your friends.”

“What would you have done, my protective custodian, if I’d sneaked off?”

“You sneaked off. I knew nothing. I was dancing and—” he burped “—drunk.”

Draco frowned and tried to shove him away but Potter’s grip was strong, even if he seemed to sway on his feet. “The Ministry—”

“Suspension at worst.”

“What if—”

“They’re your friends.”

“Still—”

“I trust your trusting them to trust them.”

“Come again?” Draco was about to argue, but he caught himself and unable to help it, smirked at the head of dark hair snuggled against his cheek. He raised his hand to hold Potter’s face closer to his own, then turned and whispered into Potter’s ear. “Git. You aren’t drunk at all, are you?”

“Totally drunk. Am.”

Draco grabbed Potter’s cup in his hand. “Right you are. And your dancing is graceful as a swan. And you and your grime smell like lilies.” He got his first ever taste of the Fairgrounds Butterbeer then and spitted it back out. It tasted awful, thin and watered down and carried a sour, almost hot aftertaste. How could everyone around him enjoy it so much?

“You smell like narcissus,” Potter lifted his chin a little and sniffed behind Draco’s ear. Draco had no time to react when he felt the tip of a tongue brush against his skin. “Taste like Mars.”

Either Potter’d meant Draco had a high mineral content, or he’d compared him to Muggle choc…

“Potter—” It was meant to be a warning, but Draco’s voice carried too much air and too little sounds to sustain any more words.

“Say ‘You’re drunk, Potter.’”

“Convince me—”

A pull on Draco’s arm. A force tore against his flesh. A loud crack! The heat from the bright stage lights above them cooled to the evening breeze and the cast iron pillar behind Draco’s back. The warmth found its way, instead, to meet Draco’s lips—and Potter’s, which were pressed against his own.

Potter kissed the way he conversed. It was short, firm and when it ended, he pulled away and let air rush between them, filling the space with pure, undulated… awkwardness.

A dull pain emerged from Draco’s back, as if finally daring to breathe too, and complain at the force that’d shoved Draco against the clock. He let his fingers ghost against his mouth, hovering between wanting to feel the moisture, the sweetness left there by the kiss and the need to wipe all traces away. His heartbeat thundered in his ears, but still he caught the tick-tock, tick-tock of the clock gears grinding their teeth behind him, as they pulled the seconds hand backwards in time.

“That’s convincing, I hope,” Potter said.

 

 

 


	5. Pretext, Context, Subtext

**~* September, 2000 *~**  

 

 

> “Kitchen and bathroom things in this package—ugly but necessary for a house. In my new job, I’ve learned that along with the bedside table, they say more about their owners than a living area ever can.
> 
> You can tell if a marriage were harmonious by seeing how the toiletries of the husband and wife are distributed around the sink. You can read their aspirations not by the painting that is the centrepiece on the mantel, by the small decorations they have kept in these private quarters—places they’d not expect anyone but themselves to frequent.
> 
> In a way, these decorations are the equivalent of a child’s doodles.
> 
> Unless the decorations were the drawing of a drill on his side of the sink, and on her side, a portrait of… for lack of a better description, a yet-to-fully-transform hog Animagus donning a golden hairpiece.
> 
> I can’t read anything at all, and perhaps it’s for the best.”

 

 

*~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~*

 

**5\. Pretext, Context, Subtext**

 

With the Ministry appointment set in the afternoon, Draco had no client scheduled for the day and worked, instead, on accounting. Potter had succumbed to a bout of stomach flu overnight, was quiet and sombre enough that Draco had begun to suspect—no, absolutely not fear—whether he’d truly been drunk the evening before.

Having valiantly let Draco Side-Along him to the office in London, located two floors above Flourish and Blotts, Potter had played the role of Draco’s office boy, and a lethargic and thoroughly incapable one at that. Maths was far from his strength, but if the Savior of the Wizarding World was good at defeating Dark Lords, he was gifted in his quill twirling skills. It was mesmerizing—not to say distracting—to see the quill spinning between the thumb and index finger across the table.

“Stop doing that,” Draco said.

Potter looked at him with his dead (and mouldy) fish eyes, before answering with an intelligent “huh?”

“Your quill. Either write with it or put it aside. Better yet, go lie down somewhere before you infect me with your pestilence, as I have no interest in depositing my entrails inside a porcelain bowl.”

“I didn’t throw up my stomach,” Potter protested. His quill had stopped spinning and was drawing things on the blank accounting sheets—no, not random doodles, but an artistic masterpiece that Draco could foresee earning him more than a few Galleons at WCove. “You won’t catch it,” Potter continued to mumble. “It’s a hangover.”

Draco decided to ignore him, if only for a brief moment because Potter’s belly began to growl, thus proving its existence in the office and not down inside a sewage drain somewhere in London.

Under the tip of Potter’s quill, meanwhile, a portrait was coming to life—the style was sparse to the extent of abstract, but somehow, Draco could make out the collar of his own robe, strands of hair falling over the sharp angles that was his face, his hand jotting down numbers in his accounting book.

Every now and then, Potter took an upward glance at Draco. Afterwards, another splash of black lines spilled over his parchment, each seemingly random and almost out of place against one another. It was not until when he’d caught Draco watching that he dropped his quill and was about to rumple up the sketch when Draco held the parchment in place with his palm.

Potter’s eyes shot up at Draco.

“How dare you try to throw me away?”

For a moment, Potter’s only reply was the bellowing _goooooooo_ from his stomach. Then he asked, “You know that’s you?”

Draco rolled his eyes, retrieved his wand and Summoned the box of tea biscuits he had hidden in his drawer. “I see it’s your brain that you vomited back in the flat. It’s a bit difficult to tell, since it’s so miniscule.”

Potter said something that sounded like “Prat.”

“Here. Use these biscuits to fill up the space. They’re upgrades for your mind, I can assure you.”

Potter took his turn to roll his eyes—he made a feeble attempt at it, at least, as he slumped forward and rested his head on the desk.

Draco resisted the urge to pat him as he’d done to Paris. It’s the shaggy hair, he reckoned.

“Not even Hermione recognizes my drawings,” Potter mumbled, with almost a pout the way he tilted his face towards Draco. “She thought I was wasting her essay ink, which I was.” As he talked, he stretched his fingers and walked them to the snack box to pull it close to himself. An explosion of paper tearing and ruffling later, he was munching on a biscuit, its golden crumbs showering all over the Draco on parchment.

“Oaf.” Draco dropped his own quill and leaned back on his chair. Any attempt to pretend to work would be futile with this Potter before him, accepting and enjoying what Draco’d offered with a contented and dazed look of a child fed with too many sweets.

Draco helped himself with a biscuit. “The Auror Office will think I’ve poisoned you, the way you’re acting.”

“Like a git?” Potter took two biscuits and ate them together. A hint of pink was returning to his face. Perhaps a minor refuel was all Potter needed to get over a stomach flu—him being The Boy Who Can’t Even Die.

“Tut tut.” Draco frowned in disproval. “Git comes in many different flavours, Potter. Today, you’re a slow git. Not of the usual brazen variety, but the git lives in you.” Spelling _Aguamenti_ on his water glass, he nudged it ever so slightly towards Potter.

It didn’t go unnoticed.

Straightened up, Potter finished what would be his brunch, picked up the glass and drank every single drop, like the tepid water was all he’d ever dreamt of until the moment. Upon slapping his hands to rid them of biscuit crumbs, he picked up the parchment, blew it clean and offered it to Draco.

“Biscuit crumbs for my—” Potter hesitated “—the first person who gets my drawings.” Seeing that Draco had yet to take the sketch from him, he cleared his throat and said again, his voice deepened, “I can smear chocolate on it.”

It was somewhere between a promise and a threat. The message was simple but clear—Potter would make sure Draco would accept it. And before Draco could offer a response or a reaction, Potter slipped the parchment between Draco’s hand and his accounting book.

“I should go change,” he approached Draco on his way out of the office. “I hope you’re all right with uniformed Aurors.”

 

 

 _All right_ was rarely an all right description for life’s events.

This little trip from Draco’s office to the Ministry, for example, was all right in many ways. They managed to Apparate from Diagon Alley to the Visitor’s Entrance with all major body parts intact (the Apparitory effects on his appendix had never been examined). There were neither encounters with trolls or hippogriffs or Muggles on roaring, grotesquely varnished bicycles nor sightings of flood or fire or windstorms or eckeltricities.

But all right took no consideration that Draco’s certain body part was becoming hard enough that he almost wished it was no longer intact, said nothing about the cause, which was his encounter with a certain young Auror in his flowing, fiery red robe and a pair of eckeltrifying dragonhide boots.

As an addendum to the Ministry’s Truthful Reporting policies and a means to trim down the bloated post war government, the Auror uniform had undergone a major overhaul, removing the shoulder pads, pectoral guard and cup protector that had, over the course of MLE history, gone through a steady growth in void volume. Also, the new design and its choice of fabric, weaved from a synthetic fibre combining silk, Veela and Demiguise hair, left little room for imagination of what it concealed. A good number of senior Aurors had resigned in its wake and the denizens of Wizarding Britain, especially those who’d only skimmed the photos of the Prophet for their knowledge of current events, had not been too sorry to see them go.

The dragonhide boots, in its menacing glossy black and armed with ultra fine spikes at the tip and the sole, were implemented later, after the group of new Aurors, Potter included, filed a grievance regarding the escalating incidence of groping they had endured, a compromise to their crime fighting ability.

Draco could imagine how hard it had been, to be engaged in a duel with a Dark wizard who happened to be kneading his enlightened arse.

Maybe the arse of an Auror was like the heels of Achillies. Maybe history would have been rewritten if the Dark Lord, rather than going for a photo-op by casting _Avada Kedavra_ , had instead poked Potter’s arse with his Elder Wand. And considering that Final Battle had been fought in a school canteen, focusing one’s effort on the visuals had seemed quite pointless.

How to word this history would have been the challenge, but the archivists would sure have figured something out—

 _“Lord Voldemort buried the tip of his wand into the arse of Harry Potter. ‘_ Expelliarmus! _’ Potter cried, but his magic had diminished with a wand on his tache fatale. His only hope was the wand in his grip, the wand Draco Malfoy had shared with him …”_

“Stop smirking,” Potter said, punching the keys on the Muggle telephone. “And put on _Occlumens_. Auror types do random snapshots on the thoughts of the people nearby, you know?”

 

 

“Come in.”

Draco Malfoy had assumed that he would meet someone slightly higher than Potter on the MLE food chain, to which he would recount his time under protective custody, and make known his opinions about his protective custodian, be they praises or complaints, in Potter’s absence.

Instead, at this moment he found his one foot already inside the Office of the Minister, his other …

BEEP BEEP BEEP! BEEP BEEP BEEP!

“Step back,” Shacklebolt said, his elbows rested on his desk and his palms clasped together. “Try again.”

BEEP BEEP BEEP! BEEP BEEP BEEP!

This time Shacklebolt gestured at Draco to retreat from the door.

BEEP BEEP BEEP! BEEP BEEP BEEP!

Shacklebolt took out his wand then and cast a wordless spell, waited a second as a shimmer burst and faded, then cast another one that was nonsense to Draco, something along the lines of _Corn-Troll-Altar-D-Litterus_.

“Again, Mr Malfoy.”

BEEP BEEP BEEP! BEEP BEEP BEEP!

With a frown, Shacklebolt waved his wand and a shimmer once again burst and faded. He then waved at Draco to enter.

No alarm sounded this time. Draco took a seat and Shacklebolt poured him a cup of tea.

“How was the protective custody coming along, Mr Malfoy? Any trouble so far?”

Draco shook his head and studied the décor of the office, a post-modernist theme of simple black and white but with a clash of metal and fabric and wood, nothing like the stuffy classical style of the rest of the Ministry. On the desk was a picture frame with a sketch of the Minister inside, curiously positioned to face the guest rather than the man who worked behind the desk.

So Draco was not the first subject of Potter’s portraits. Draco felt a not-pang or not-heartburn in his chest.

It must be Potter’s stomach flu.

“Can you tell me what that picture is?” Shacklebolt asked. He was looking at Draco, but without Potter’s intensity that Draco … had grown accustomed to. His expression was soft, almost like a parent’s doting on his child.

“That’s you, Minister,” Draco replied, wishing he could supplement it with the _Are you a troll?_ frown for emphasis.

To his answer Shacklebolt let out a low chuckle. It was soothing, almost hypnotic. “I and the artist of this piece, we had a bet, I said no one could ever tell it was me. Even I myself couldn’t tell who—what—it was. And the artist said… Merlin knows what, he had a mouthful of sweets at the time.”

Draco didn’t smile to that.

“Now I owe your Potter a sickle and a year’s supply of chocolate frogs for his cubicle.”

“Potter isn’t mine.” And Draco must be falling under Shacklebolt’s hypnosis, for he went on to say, “Not that I have trouble owning him if I put in the effort.”

Shacklebolt’s smile was too knowing for comfort. It was Dumbledore’s twinkling eyes in matte. “So, having you in my office in one piece, I’d assume things are going well between you two? Any further attempts of assault?”

“I thought Potter has owled MLE daily reports.”

“He has, but I can’t say I believe all of it.”

Was the Minister of Magic questioning the integrity of his Employee of the Month/Year/Decade? And before an ex Death Eater, no less?

At that moment, Draco learned something about himself, something he had no pride for—his ears would twitch in anticipation of groundbreaking input.

If Shacklebolt had noticed Draco’s house-elven tendencies, he gave away nothing. “Potter had a habit, shall we say, to downplay the problems he faces in his tasks.”

“His ego gets in the way?”

“His past gets in the way. He doesn’t want to bother others with what he sees as trivial, and after what he’s gone through, everything’s trivial for him——even if he’s missing a limb or two.”

“Why are you sharing this with me?”

“Because I’d like you to tell me the truth, Mr Malfoy. And if I want your trust, mine has to be placed on you first.” his eyes scanned across Draco’s face. “Potter believes in you.”

Draco let those words sink in, words that were giving him a heartburn of a different sort. The hearth they’d built in his chest was not a bad place to be.

But as Potter had yelled on the Fairgrounds: _Constant Vigilance!_ Why Shacklebolt was the Minister was apparent—this wizard could talk a poltergeist into monkhood. Draco sipped his cup of tea as he poured ice all over his heart.

“I thought MLE’s caught the suspect who’d etched my face.”

“We did. This why there’s something the Auror Office—and, I, I confess—need to confirm. I talked to Harry while MLE had you inspected for latent spell damages and suspicious magical signatures. And as you know, he’s going through an upset stomach. Do you have any idea what’d caused it?”

“It's a stomach flu.” His voice carried a whiff of concern. Draco’s nose twitched in disapproval.

Shacklebolt shook his head. “That’s what he told me as well, but I’m not blind. He’s recovering from was a bezoar overdose. I assume he had quite a fill maybe yesterday or the evening before. I skimmed over the result of your checkup just now. You, his charge and the potential target, have no potions in your system. Or any bezoar.”

“This isn’t an accusation—not at all, Mr Malfoy.” Shacklebolt stopped Draco from narrowing his eyes, from tilting his chin—from questioning just that. “I just want to know if you two had run into situations that’d required the bezoar in the first place.”

“No.” Draco’s knuckles were white as he braced his teacup with a death grip.

“Did you two go to unfamiliar locations? Offered any consumables that you or Harry suspected might impair your judgment?”

For the whole week, everywhere Draco had gone, Harry had followed. Everything Harry had eaten, Draco had—

—except the fizzy Butterbeer at the Fairgrounds.

“Mr Minister, have you ever had fizzy Butterbeer?”

 

 

“Of course.” Shacklebolt didn’t seem to mind Draco’s change of topic. “Departments here love it in parties.”

“What does the drink taste like to you?”

Shacklebolt thought for a moment, furrows formed between his eyebrows again as if an improper response could lead to a catastrophic plummet of the Gringotts-Prophet Bartering Index. When he answered, his voice was grave as well. “Sweeter than sweet. More lard than butter, more mead than beer. More steaming than fizzy.”

Fizzy Butterbeer or steaming lard mead, there was no mention of a runny consistency or a horrible aftertaste. No sourness. No spice.

What Professor Snape had once taught Draco came to mind. A preventative measure against poisoning was to make a suspension of bezoars and let it settle below the suspicious food or drink to be consumed. This method could rarely be employed in stealth, however, because the bezoar’s distinctive taste and appearance made it impossible to conceal.

Unless it was night time. Unless the dazzling lights—and chocolates—had blinded the other parties involved.

Draco remembered how Potter had held his cup under the soda fountain rather than Levitating it over—it’d been to make sure he wouldn’t accidentally swap it with other cups, had it? The suspension, Draco imagined, would have been placed in the cup before hand.

“We were at the Fairgounds Saturday night and he went wild with the fizzy Butterbeer. I carry my own drink. He probably added some bezoar in the cup to keep himself from getting drunk, since he’s on duty.”

This was a fair and honest assessment—a proof that Potter was serious about his task, a proof that Draco was … appreciative of his protection.

Shacklebolt nodded his approval. He would have known about Draco’s ties to the Fairground.

But why did it give Draco such a sting on his heart to say it?

Could it be because what had left Draco an impression about Potter from the Fairgrounds, and had, perhaps, made Draco receptive to the kiss that had landed on his lips by the clock, had been how carefree Potter had acted that evening, how he’d danced, how he’d seemed so comfortable in the world that’d belonged to Draco’s friends?

The same world still darkened by the lingering storm clouds from the war, that had yet to clear because Voldemort’s bones were buried there; the same world inhabited by _Them_ , who Potter had identified Draco to be a part of.

As he digested the new information, Shacklebolt was in his thinking mode again—leaning forward with his hands clasped before his mouth, as Draco had first seen him outside the office. “And one more thing you have the right to know,” he said, his words a slow, smooth wave that aimed to sooth, as if he was about to deliver the news of the latest trend in Muggle fashions. “You have a variant of the Trace placed on you. Similar to the ones the Ministry issues to underage wizards.”

“Potter put it on me?” A shot of chill raced down along Draco’s spine, the antithesis of the chocolates that’d used to glide down his throats.

The blink of Shacklebolt’s eyes, slow in sympathy, confirmed Draco’s suspicion before he continued. “Just now, my alarm went off because a Trace on a visitor is considered a bug. I feel obligated to share this with you—putting a Trace on the charge isn’t the standard protocol of protective custody.”

“You should talk to Potter then,” Draco said, his tongue sharpened to a drawl.

Shacklebolt let out a sigh. He looked neither angered nor embarrassed by what his star Auror did, but rather, a little … was it exasperation that Draco saw?

“The Ministry had no right to interfere because Harry didn’t hide his magical signature. He’s made it very clear that the Trace came from a civilian source. The information the Trace collects from you—if it does collect anything—goes to him and not the MLE. Which means—” Shacklebolt leaned back, his shoulders slumped “—this is a private matter between you two.”

“There are no laws against placing Traces on other wizards?”

“It falls under the auspices of privacy violation. You’ll have to submit a formal complaint before a separate investigation file will be opened.” He paused for a moment, before continuing. “I confess, this is why this discussion is somewhat difficult for my part…”

“You want to defend him, of course. Everyone knows—” Draco attempted a smirk. What came out instead was a chuckle, sad and with a bitter, bitter aftertaste. “—Harry Potter can do no wrong.”

“On the contrary.” Shacklebolt shook his head. He drummed his fingers on the desk, just like what Professor Snape had used to do when he’d thought all his students had left the classroom. “Harry… he can be a bit of a lost sheep sometimes.”

That was unexpected. Draco helped himself with another cup of tea, as a display of his enthusiasm to hear just how lost Potter was. He was prepared to soak it all up, then use it as ammunition to yet another battle he would rage against Potter.

As to why the Minister was sharing the information with him—that was none of Draco’s concern.

Shacklebolt watched on, then rummaged the drawer and pulled out a bag of Ministry chocolates. A hint of smile lifted the corner on his lips and his eyes flickered towards Potter’s sketch every now and then. “Or shall I say, Harry is clueless when it comes to anything other than chasing Dark wizards.”

“He isn’t too clueless to put a Trace on me.”

Shacklebolt sat back and ate a piece of chocolate. “Are you a Dark wizard, Mr Malfoy?”

No one had ever asked Draco that, not since the start of the war. Draco bit his lips and answered, “No”.

“Good.” Shacklebolt nodded, as if Draco had answered an OWLS question correctly. “A confirmation is reassuring. As far as I know, you’re an upstart designerwizard, one of the best in Britain.” He paused and Draco felt heat rising onto his face. “That being said, Mr Malfoy, you’re one of those people Harry has no idea how to chase.”

“He doesn’t need to chase me, Minister, I’m in his bedroom every night,” Draco said…

That was not what he’d intended to say.

But it was too late to take anything back. Shacklebolt broke into a jovial laugh—something Draco would never expect to see on the composed, often grave Minister—and threw Draco a piece of chocolate. Draco caught it with his hands. “Don’t mind me,” Shacklebolt said, his laughter soon under control. “I know of the arrangement, how he had part of your manor in his flat.”

Draco glared at him. There must be something in the Ministry paint. Everyone who worked there lost their mind over time.

“Mr Malfoy, may I call you Draco?”

And Nargles had never appeared in mistletoe, as Lovegood had claimed, because they infested the Ministry carpets and drove all the employees off the rocker.

Still, Draco nodded.

“As everyone and their boggart in the Wizarding world knows, Harry’s never had a normal family. What he knows about caring for others—others who aren’t his Hermione’s and Weasley’s— he knows it through his support network during the war. That is, people like myself, whose only goal at the time was to keep him alive.”

Draco kept silent. What was he to say to that? _Lucky him? Thanks for making my father a failure?_

“I don’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” Shacklebolt said. The chocolate in Draco’s hand shook its wrapping off, then jumped for Draco’s attention. “That was how I saw that period of my life, from my perspective. Should I continue?”

Draco popped it in his mouth like a pill, took a sip of tea to wash it down. Then he nodded.

“Harry often knew nothing about the plans we’d made for him. We didn’t want him to worry, that’s one, but the other reason, the one that was rarely said but understood, was we didn’t want him to argue with us.”

“Because you’re right?”

“Mostly,” Shacklebolt answered with a smile. “But hindsight is a spectrespec, isn’t it? In our defence, our decisions had never been rash, so reasoning wouldn’t have been the issue.” He took a breath and his grave look returned. “We didn’t want to argue with Harry, Draco, simply because we didn’t want to upset him. We love the child. Maybe not as much as how Lucius Malfoy loved you as a son, but close enough. We didn’t want to see the rift grow between him and us—the rift that’d always been there even when no one’d ever talked about it…” He sighed.

Draco waited for him to continue.

“The rift that’d started with us being alive on one end and his parents gone on the other.”

“You’re trying to say that Potter is doing the same thing to me.” Draco could feel the connection within his reach, but it was abstract and difficult to grasp.

So Potter’d been used to being protected without knowledge, by those who’d cared for him, by those who’d loved him the most…

Oh.

“It’s pure speculation, but consider it a possibility,” Shacklebolt said. “There’s always been a rift between you and him and he…” He trailed off, took the picture frame with his sketch on the desk, folded its legs and placed it before Draco. “Take this with you. I told Harry before that that’s what I’ll do—give the picture to the first person who can tell me what it is. He who sees it deserves to have it.”

Draco refrained from closing his fingers around the picture, from reading between the lines and trying to understand what he saw, or why he saw. “I still don’t understand why you’re telling me this.” He gave in the fight and picked up the picture for a close look. The ink was the Aquamarine required for Ministry documents, and it was so obvious, so intuitive for Draco to see the Minister in the sketch, hovering over a messy desk that had to be Potter’s. “And why you seem to think I won’t hex Potter to within an inch of his life when I see him again.”

Shacklebolt didn’t respond for a while. Silence hung in the air.

Draco found himself cleaning the glass of picture frame with his cuff.

“Harry once showed me the chocolate house—well, more like I found it in his flat and he had to explain it under my orders, because I could sense that every little piece was saturated with the signature of … an ancient bloodline.”

The picture frame had slipped away from Draco’s hand. The Unmentionable had been mentioned, by someone that was neither him nor Potter. It was as if a spell had broken. Shacklebolt’s gaze at him was warm and unobtrusive. Still, he felt the urge to look down and away.

“And time, Draco. And heart. He never told me the story behind it, but what it meant to him, even the blind could see. To have his first home rebuilt—”

“He hated that place.” Draco found his need to correct the … misperception. “I hated those chocolates—”

Shacklebolt held up his hand. “I don’t need the details. But Harry—as I’m sure you’re well aware, he’s not good with words. If he does something that makes you think, makes you… feel, then—take this from me, from someone who’s worked with him for years—” his voice softened, “believe that’s what he wants you to know.”

The clock on the wall chimed four. The picture frame Levitated itself from the carpet, felt its way along the rim of Draco’s pocket and tumbled inside, like a child who’d been lost, was exhausted and relieved to find its home.

Draco couldn’t help the smile on his face and he patted his pocket. “Now, my turn to ask you one thing, Mr Minister. What’s your role in all this?”

Shacklebolt gave a mischievous quirk of his eyebrow, a perfect imitation of a young Malfoy’s.

“I’m eager to put my star pupil in the field,” he answered, sitting back in his chair and looking ever bit like a proud father. “But he needs to know his life doesn’t need justifications. The idea that the only purpose—the condition—of his existence is to fight crime… that should be his past.” He tore out a purple stub from his notepad and a paper bird soon zoomed over Draco’s head. Shacklebolt watched it fly away. “So, before I assign him missions, I’m making sure that Harry’ll have a shot at something—that something he’s found worthy to go home for.”

Another set of oak double doors materialized on the opposite side of the office. A round of knocking soon resonated in the room, rousing a dumbfounded Draco, who had to be a troll to not understand what the Minister meant.

“Good day, Mr Malfoy,” Shacklebolt said. “Your Auror’s in the Atrium. Don’t make him wait too long.”

 

 

Potter was leaning against the gate at the end of the Atrium, its gilded gold and his Auror red a perfect display of Gryffindor colours. With one knee folded back, his dragonhide boots, the one pressed against the vine relief on the gate door, tapped a light-hearted rhythm that complimented the smile on his face. From the sapphire ceiling, the stars showered their light upon him, upon the flowing robe that, like a brook that showed every rock it bubbled upon, glided along the contour of a lean but muscled chest, a hard abdomen that led to the curve on the groin, its fullness emphasized by the way Potter was standing, with his hips tilted upwards to make room for his lifted leg hidden behind it.

But he wasn’t waiting for Draco. A few of his colleagues were standing around him and they were chatting.

Someone said something and Potter laughed. One of his companions took this moment to wrap his arm around Potter’s shoulder and Potter returned the favour without a hint of hesitation, resting his head briefly on his friend’s shoulder as his laughter subsided.

He looked so at home. Relieved, almost.

This was his world, his Them. He wouldn’t put a Trace on anyone beside him, would he? Even if he’d love them, care for them just as much.

Draco chewed his lips, retreated to the nearest fireplace behind him and ducked inside.

 

 

 


	6. The Way to a Wizard’s Heart

**~* July, 2000 *~**

 

> “Beds. If they’re the stage of our dreams, they’ve seen the ultimate play about us. Funny how your bed is so tiny compared to your cousin’s, when the drama that has been your life is so much grander than his.”

 

 

 

*~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~*

 

**6\. The Way to a Wizard’s Heart**

 

Draco’d imagined what he’d used the spare key to Potter’s flat for—from going back to the manor at mid-day to change out his clothes (his job sometimes gave him the worst surprises—the most memorable one involving a pet skunk) to hauling a drunk Potter back to his home (never happened, and given what had happened two days ago, never would).

This wasn’t one of them.

It was easy to find the corner of the manor that hadn’t managed to fit into Potter’s bedroom—the corner that Draco had seen Potter kick in on his first evening here—but finding something that could lift it like a door-block was something else. In the end, it was Potter’s spare key that did it. The flat was able to tell that the surgeon was its guardian and trust it to do no harm.

Draco swept his wand in the slit that’d opened up and fired a slew of Alohomoras. He had no idea where the locking spells that had held his home to Potter’s bedroom were located. He wasn’t even sure if Potter had used locking spells at all.

Thirty minutes. That was the maximum length of time Draco reckoned he would have to make his exit, before Potter would head home—thinking, knowing that Draco had made his way back before him. Of course, Potter would still find out Draco’s whereabouts—but it was the principle of it that matters.

The principles that were…

This was not the time for Draco to lay out his principles of life, was it? They would, after all, encompass an encyclopaedic length of subjects, including dignity, privacy, pride, and…

He betted the thoughts of dental health away, then Banished, no, Incendioed the word love that flashed across his mind.

 _Alohomora_ wasn’t working. Maybe he should try a Shrinking Spell first, determine where the two living quarters were tethered to one another, then sever those ties before trying to wriggle his manor out of position. He just had to be careful enough to not tear the two places apart as the size changed.

With that decision made, Draco stood and slapped his hands and knees clean. Before doing so, he certainly did not cast _Scourgify_ to clear the dust in the crack.

“ _Reducio!_ ” Draco shouted, pointing his wand at the crystal chandelier that marked the centre of the hallway between his bedroom and the junction between the manor and Potter’s flat. The air bellowed as pressure built, then the walls screeched as they rippled and scraped against their shell.

The spell was about to take effect when everything stopped moving, as if magic had been frozen or time suspended. The walls ceased to shudder, the chandelier no longer swung on its hinge. The air hissed like a deflating balloon before silence fell.

A light _woof!_ sounded behind Draco.

Draco turned. It was Paris, of course, the puppy had woken up and was looking at Draco with sad, sad eyes. For once, it was awake AND languid, cuddling against the wizard it usually had little good will for…

Potter was looking at Draco with equally sad puppy eyes. His wand remained pointed to the air, after completing its _Finite Incantatem_ on Draco’s spell.

In the late afternoon sun, Potter still looked a little pale, but the intensity in his eyes, the wildness of his hair, his strong, steady gait were all back. He seemed at a lost for words for a moment, and then he blurted—out of every other thing in the world he could have said—this:

“I was looking for you.”

If Draco’s jaw line had not been as hard and as perfect, his jaw would have dropped in sheer disgust. Potter had been many things in his mind: a snob infected with a handshaking curse, a seeker whose inner eye was his arsehole (bare in mind that Draco’d been twelve when he’d thought that one up), a Dementor’s damsel in distress, a stinking champion, the simpler, definitely more elegant git and finally, recipient of his owl… droppings.

But he had never seen Potter as a casual liar. That revelation was enough for Draco to turn around, aimed his wand and shouted, “ _Incarcerous_!”

The element of surprise was enough for Draco to win this round. That, and the first thing Potter did, which was to let go of Paris in his arms. A black rope tightened itself around Potter’s torso, then sought the nearest strong posts it could find.

Which meant that, in a mere second’s worth of time, Potter had vanished into Draco’s bedroom. Draco followed. The mattress voiced a deep unf!!! as the rope slung Potter onto the bed, then coiled its way around his arms and tied his wrists to the bedposts.

The Fates A) hated Draco and B) were kinky perverts. Draco cursed them. Ridiculous coincidences like these should only happen in fiction—those of questionable quality that the Dark Lord had once confiscated from Draco’s mother, when she’d caught reading them during his monologues (and had been suspiciously missing ever since).

On Draco’s bed, meanwhile, Potter looked one part confused and three parts amused.

The puppy that had managed to escape just in time began to run in circles around Draco, a fluffy white cloud that was barking, no, wailing, pleading for Draco to release his victim.

“Shut up, Paris,” Draco said.

The puppy showed no signs of relenting.

Potter chuckled on the bed. He seemed so at ease in the face of Draco’s offence, which obviously meant nothing to him—

“You. You shut up too, Potter.” Draco pointed his finger and stormed over to the side of the bed where Potter lay. Paris let out a yelp and buried itself under Draco’s covers. “The Trace has to be rubbish if you have to search for me. Which one is it, Potter? Is the Trace rubbish or is it your lies?”

Amusement drained away from Potter, leaving behind confusion. “Trace?”

“Don’t play innocent with me.” Draco bent forward, his palms planted on the two sides of Potter’s head, and he hovered his face above Potter’s. His cheeks were red—he could see that on Potter’s glasses—from exertion, from rage, from…

“Dunno what you’re talking about.” Potter sounded calm, but he commenced to twist and yank the binds. Draco could see his biceps rippling under the rope, under the flimsy fabric of the Auror uniform.

“Your boss told me I had a non-Ministry issued Trace—”

“I don’t Trace people.”

“—with your magical signature.”

Potter shook his head as he scaled up his attempts to fight off the Binding Spell. The bed squeaked under his effort, his combination of physical force and innate defensive magic…

Draco’s bed, passed on to him from his father Lucius, his grandfather Abraxus and everyone before who’d extended the Malfoy line…

It left Draco with no choice but to straddle Potter and hold him down with his own weight, pushing against Potter’s struggling arms with his hands.

What was he supposed to do next?

If he’d let Potter go, who knew what Potter would do to him in retaliation? (Although the way Potter was looking at him, maybe…Draco would tolerate it.) But if the Malfoy Bed ® broke under Draco’s keep, he would never be able to hold his head up high in the entrance hall of the manor again. The wrath he would sustain from the portraits—

—and worst, their recounts of the Bed’s glory of old. He could hear them already, from the traditional

_… how I, Funny-Name Malfoy, wielded my manly sword of steel to part the meat curtain of your grand-grand-grand-grand-grandmother…_

—to the modernist, but equally trauma-inducing

_…pressed the knob that transmitted the loudest distress signal, and I, Funny-Name Malfoy! Slid open the doors of your grand-grand-grand-grand-grandmother and revealed the Black Hole!_

His face must have shown horror, for…

“Are you all right?” Potter’s voice was an airy mixture of words and gasps—just enough to blow Draco off the course of his morbid imagination.

If not for the situation in hand, Draco would have thanked him. “Don’t break the bed, Potter,” he said. “My ancestors will kill me.”

And just like that, the body under Draco relaxed and stopped moving. Was this a fight, or was it a game? The situation had not improved for Draco, either—for now there’s a bound, boneless and sweaty heap of Potter on Draco’s bed, with Draco for a topping.

Draco didn’t notice how close their faces had approached towards each another when Potter spoke again.

“Don’t leave.”

Why was Draco still straddling Potter? He had no proper cause anymore, especially when he felt Potter’s…

He should get off. He really should.

“Why?” Draco asked. He would soon be hard himself. He really, really should…

“Don’t want to write a report,” Potter said.

“That’s it?”

Potter’s breath caught. He worried his lower lip, looked at Draco for a moment and answered with a soft, “Yeah”.

Detaching from Potter was simple after that. Draco swung his legs to the floor, opened his drawers of his bedside table and unable to find what he was looking for, Summoned it with his wand. His parchment fluttered into the bedroom, followed by a dart that was his quill and a bullet that was his inkpot. They zipped to a stop and landed on his desk with a thud.

“I’ll write it,” he drawled. “What do you want to say?”

It was meant to be a rhetorical question. For a moment, silence reigned the space, the distance between the two. But Potter, after shifting a little to make himself more comfortable with the bounds, spoke again as he studied the relief on the ceiling.

“First, Draco Malfoy is a prat.”

“Easy.” Teeth clenched, Draco scribbled it down on the parchment, putting so much force on the dot of the i’s and the stroke of the t’s that it’s a wonder the quill didn’t snap into halves. “And then?”

“His bedroom’s under my roof. His home’s in mine and he tried to tear them apart. He doesn’t get it.”

“Fine.” His answer caught in a swallow, Draco wrote it down, noticing how his anger was morphing into a serious case of nerves. His hand shook, the black ink dripping all over the parchment—

“Mrs Weasley told me this: blood magic, which protected me as a kid, is just one of the many old magic that nobody knows how it works. She told me,—” his gaze drifted, as if he’d lost himself in a memory“—if you prepare some food with heart, no matter how bad it tastes, it leaves a mark in the person you do it for. A faint Trace, if you will. ‘Wizards have sworn to it’, she said. So I cooked something for the prat—the simplest, most Muggle thing.”

 _Noodle Desperado_. And the Malfoys… hadn’t cooked for centuries. Draco dropped his quill and stared at Potter, who paid no attention to him, seemingly entranced in his conversation with the ceiling.

“Shacklebolt’s known about the chocolate house because he’d spotted a Trace inside me and was worried sick. I had to tell him. Today he told the prat—who’d made that house—that he, too, had the Trace thing, after a week in my flat. Did it shine a light? No.” Potter gave a sad smile and a little shrug, as much as he could with the rope around him. “Because whatever this magic is, it doesn’t have a name.”

“Then—” Potter’s words seemed to flow out between his lips, what that stopped them, broken them—caution, perhaps?—had retreated for a moment. “—the prat had me tied to his bed. I was a sweaty, horny mess. I was so hard. He must’ve felt it. He’s sitting on me. But—” he glanced sideways, away from the ceiling, away from Draco “—he went to sit at the desk. He wants to take notes.”

There was shuffling and ruffling among the sheets. Paris peeked out from underneath, took a look to check that the coast was clear—that no major hexing was taking place—and went to lap Potter’s face with its pink felt tongue.

“Later, Paris,” Potter whispered, nuzzling his face against the puppy. “You’re ticklish. I can’t scratch.”

The puppy shook his fur and as if it understood and was determined to be obedient, curled up above Potter’s bound body. The white fur blanket wasn’t something Potter would appreciate at the moment, but he said nothing and nudged the puppy with his hips as a pat.

Potter then turned to Draco, who remained glued to the chair, just short of being _Petrified_.

“Case summary,” he went on, his voice light as the green in his eyes, softened by the evening sun pouring in through the window. “Draco Malfoy is a prat who hides behind words, and I’m rubbish at words. They’re jinxes—they’ve made up crazy stories about me, hide in a glass ball and rule my life for years. I’m all right playing the idiot who don’t bother with complete sentences, but one word… I wish I find it easier to say. I know what it is. It’s brilliant. It’s kept me alive. But it’s heavy. Life-and-death heavy. It will always be for me. A weapon—and we’ve seen enough, fought enough wars in our lives.”

With all the strength he had left in his body, Draco waved his wand and the ropes on Potter shimmered and vanished.

But Potter opted to stay in his position, his regained freedom channelled only to a few rotations of his stiff wrists and a slight turn of his body, so that it faced Draco along with his face.

A strange thought came to Draco then—the few coherent ones he still had facilities to process. Potter had always been at home right there on Draco’s bed, long before the binding spell had been cast. He had always been Draco’s nightmare, one that he’d never wanted to wake up from, for the real thing was too wild, too dangerous, too fiery to be anymore than a wet dream, a fantasy.

True, fantasies were like fire—good servants, bad masters. But the Fates had long handed the reins to Potter, along with the whips, chains and collars (being kinky perverts that they were). The best Draco could do was to not fall on his knees, to delay the inevitable—

—for at this moment, the supple lines of Potter’s chest and abdomen were all the more apparent, imprinted on the robe by the ropes and his sweat. Below them, what remained of his arousal drew a curve under the scarlet, his flesh heavy against the softness fabric, smooth and succulent like wine-filled chocolates—

“I want a chance. But Draco Malfoy is a prat…” Even worse were the eyes that swept across Draco’s face—the heated challenge in them could set Draco’s blood to a boil in one second flat. “A prat who’ll bolt when I’m done talking.”

Potter was right.

And this time, Draco didn’t have a spare key with him.

 

 

 


	7. Double Date at St Mungo’s

**~* April, 2000 *~**

 

> “Enclosed are the basic furnishings for the chocolate house I sent you a year ago: carpets, wallpaper and ceiling lights. The Manor still harbors a mountain of chocolates that needs to be Banished and rebuilding a model-scale Muggle home is, indeed, a good practice project for my career—the need to kill my inner taste buds for the sake of my craft is one that will be of great use to me.
> 
> Consider them owl droppings. Do not thank me for them. I have sent the package in a white paper box to emulate the look.
> 
> PS. I said “nothing will be exchanged between us except the chocolates”, which means the chocolates are specific, and not all the chocolates you can find in the world. Yes, you know English well enough to understand that, even if I’d claimed otherwise.”

 

 

 

*~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~*

 

**7\. Double Date at St Mungo’s**

 

“I fucked it up, when I should have fucked him.” Legs bent and wrapped in his arms, Draco mumbled, bobbing his chin against his knees.

Miss Mannequin blinked at him. Three times. _Yes_.

“Oh, shut up.”

The plastic blue eyes blinked once, slowly, under the fluttering eyelashes.

That meant … _sad_. “Sorry.” Draco was sincere. “I’m being insensitive.”

Draco was sitting behind the display window of Purge and Dowse beside the mannequin. He’d found a clothes rack—still with a few jackets on it somehow—to conceal the view of himself from the passerbys in the street, sparse as the visiting hour had long been over.

He had, literally, jumped out the window of Potter’s flat, forgetting that there’d been neither a broom he could Summon from nearby nor could be Apparate from mid-air, given the residence was in a Muggle town.

Potter’s presence was the cause, the inspiration for Draco’s every prattiness. It could unleash Draco’s inner-Goyle like nothing else. At least, Draco had had the quick wit to disguise himself as a dildo, after vetoing the textbook-standard that had been the flowerpot, an outdated approach as centuries-old wizards had never considered tall tower blocks and the risk of crushing one’s spine during the fall.

Knowledge was power, and Draco’s expertise in Phallistry had saved the day, if not his arse. Not only was his haphazard rendition of a dildo realistic in its shape and form, it was as sturdy and easy to clean. The best thing about playing a dildo was that even the most outstanding citizen would not be so considerate to pick it up and throw it in a rubbish bin. All Draco had had to endure during his wait for an empty street, therefore, had been a few snickers as well as a long discussion among the pedestrians regarding which flat the dildo could have fallen from.

Draco had gained a new respect for Muggles—they all seemed to be natural experts in Phallistry.

He’d suffered a few scratches and bruises, most of which incurred on his ego. He’d come to St Mungo’s by instinct, but after he’d passed through the display window, he’d realized that he—or rather, his bruised ego—would not be able to get through the receptionist.

It was far too embarrassing. He could already imagine his new alias on the Prophet’s gossip page, which had occupied half of the newspaper’s volume after the war and would surely have room for this: “Dildo Draco”. It’s too catchy to become anything less than a hit.

And Draco’s business required him to meet with customers.

So he’d ended up sitting here, talking to Miss M while he’d tended his own wounds. He reckoned she wouldn’t share the story with anyone else.

After all, it’s common knowledge that Miss M was only capable of performing a single spell, which Draco believed to be a variant of _Alohomora_. Comprehending human speech but having no means to talk, the chipped plastic eyes and cobwebbed eyelashes were the only tools she had to convey her world.

Draco wondered what she had done to deserve such punishment.

Behind her was a door that led to the dressing rooms. When Draco had made himself comfortable in the store, that door’d swung open by itself, its motion made known by the ensuing flutter of papers. Written on them were the instructions on how to read Doll Language, which Draco had since used to communicate with her.

“I’ve left the manor in Potter’s flat. I have to go back and get it somehow.”

Miss M gave a cross-eyed stare to the outside.

“Now? He’s going to Sectumsempra me again.”

A single blink.

“No? Wait. What do you know about Sectumsempra?”

Hesitation. Just when Draco was about to call her bluff, the upper half of window in front of her vanished, then reappeared before the lower half did the same thing—while the blue eyes did a perfect eye-roll.

Draco chuckled. “That’s impressive.”

A wink. _Thank you_.

For a moment, Draco wondered if this would be an appropriate question to ask, given their friendship was still so young:

“How do you live like this? It must be so dull.”

Outside the window, the last hint of twilight disappeared from the skies.

“Hospital,” Draco thought he heard, followed by, as soft as the word before, “cry” and “laugh”.

“You can talk?”

She crossed her eyes and stared at the sky again. This “gesture” seemed to be her favourite.

“Now?”

Three blinks— _yes_ —and a three second shut— _sleep_.

“You can only talk … in sleep? At night? Is that what you mean?”

Three more blinks. The accompanying voice said “date.”

“Sixteenth of July.”

A blank expression, before a single blink followed. _No_.

“I’m certain. I filled in my accounting book this morning.”

Miss M glanced at him.

“Me?” Draco asked.

A repeat of three blinks plus “date”.

“Merlin, I’m not good at charades, Miss M. What are you trying to say? Me date? I date?”

Three blinks.

“Are you asking who I’m dating?” Draco laughed, deciding that he really, really liked her. “You don’t mince any … blinks, do you?”

The blue eyes drew a full circle around the sockets. _Maybe_.

“All right, think,” Draco ordered himself. It’s strange to have a one-man conversation and he felt the need to fill the space with more words. He clucked his tongue several times and remembering how she’d been smitten around Potter, and how he’d just told her what happened between him and Potter, he made his bet, “you want to know if Potter and I are dating?”

Triple blinks, in quick succession.

“Merlin, how can I forget, you’re another one of his fangirls. I can’t believe you didn’t know he… dazzles.”

To that Miss M was unresponsive.

“Regardless—” Draco took a breath “—no, I don’t think Potter and I were dating. And certainly not after the earlier incident.”

Three blinks again. “Yes? What do you mean by yes?”

“Date.”

“You think we’re dating? We should date?”

_Yes. Yes. Yes._

Draco let out an exasperated chuckle. “When, exactly, Miss M, would like to see us date?” His amusement, he supposed, was in part due to the mannequin reminding him of Pansy. His old friend had had the full faculty of speech, of course, but had been just as cryptic, especially towards their later years in Hogwarts.

It’d been a Slytherin tradition: planting daggers, solving mysteries… all in one fireside conversation in the common room. It was their game of chess, except every word was a new piece—and every placement, a new move.

He missed her. He wondered how she was doing in Sicily.

Meanwhile, Miss M gave another cross-eyed gaze at the sky.

“Now? You want Potter and I to date… now?”

_Yes._

“I told you. This isn’t the right time.” Draco Pensieved the moment in his mind: another new low of his life, debating against a mannequin and not exactly victorious. “I take responsibility for the debacle, but a date of us two…isn’t happening anytime soon.”

More like never.

“Want.” The whisper echoed in Draco’s ears again, more air than sound. He noticed that with every word, she sounded a bit weaker than before.

“You want us to? Do I want to?”

“Both.” The _th_ dragged on, like a leak from a sealed cauldron.

“You can’t talk for long, can’t you? Rest a bit. I’ll try to understand your eyes.”

She insisted. “Both.”

So here she was, Dear Miss Mannequin, Draco’s new friend for less than two hours, not only demanding Draco to date Potter, but also if Draco wanted to date Potter.

Then why was it so difficult for Draco to walk away, to ignore her? He could spend the night in his office or re-open the secret quarters in the portion of the manor still in Wiltshire. He was homeless… but not quite. He sighed. “Yes, I don’t mind a date with the git. With Potter.”

The mannequin’s eyes crossed. This time, they stayed that way: _now, now, now, now, now_.

“You’re a Gryffindor, aren’t you?” No wonder Draco wouldn’t be winning this little tug of war any time soon.

A roll of eyes in the eye-socket—maybe, again—and the eye-crossing resumed.

Unbelievable. Where did she get the idea that Draco Malfoy could be manipulated?

And why was Draco worrying that her eyeballs would get stuck in the socket?

“Look. Even if I manage to get him on a date at this hour, there’s no place for us to go. I can book a restaurant for tomorrow night, maybe.” This place probably used Ministry-approved paint and Nargles-infested carpets. But it was just an excuse, wasn’t it? Empty words to pacify a mannequin, who Draco doubt he’d see again after tonight.

 _Draco Malfoy is a git who hides behind words_ , Potter had said.

The plastic eyes were looking down at the feet. That was a new gesture. Draco flipped through the instruction book to the Eye-to-Foot session and found the meaning of this one: _here_.

“Miss M, no offence to your workplace, but hospitals are not exactly dating spots.”

Here, she “repeated” and as she did so, all the display windows around the storefront vanished and appeared, over and over again.

What she was trying to say was clear—she’d like to see Draco and Potter date, NOW, in the department store where she was—this small, filthy place between the window and curtain of lights on the other end that was the doorway to the hospital’s Admission area.

The request begged for one question to be asked, “Why?”

Miss M blinked. A rhythmic close and open, close and open…

She was thinking, deciding on something. Then…

One blink. Eyes wide open with a faraway stare. The rapid eyelash fluttering sequence she’d shown Potter the day he’d signed Draco out.

_No. See. Love._

Draco leaned back against the carpet—never mind the Nargles, he’d proven himself certifiable at this point—and propped his body up on his lower arms.

“But sure you’ve seen it before. Your view—” he pushed the clothes rack aside and tilted his head to look outside the window, to the streetlamp and its hazy yellow light showering the deserted pavement “—is the perfect spot to people watch. I’m sure many couples have hugged and kissed under that lamp. To make it out alive of St. Mungo’s,” Draco stood and rested his elbow on her shoulders, “is more often than not worth a celebration, an unfortunate public display of love.”

He wasn’t expecting to hear the whisper again, gaining back a little strength given the rest in between, but was still weak. “Forget.”

Draco turned to look at her. She did sad again, the slow blink followed by the fluttering eyelashes.

Up close, why that meant sad became apparent. There must be a small chip somewhere in the socket—a rough patch of surface—that caught the paint on her eyes and yielded a light scratch when she blinked. Tiny flakes of paint had fallen on her dress.

The first thing that came out of Draco’s mouth was “Don’t cry. It’s all right.” as he patted her back.

“Sun,” Miss Mannequin whispered. The window before her opened as it did for exiting visitors, a code for _Out_ or _Outside_.

She whispered again, soft as a dream. “Forget.”

 

 

The department store that had once been Purge and Dowse was a curious place. During the next hour in which Draco scoured the store, looking for empty shelves and broken racks to remodel for the makeshift dining room, he found as many things that carried strong residual magic—Glamoured price tags that increased their number after they left the rack, for example, or shoe stretchers disguised as dust bunnies that made the shoes more comfortable in the fitting area—as eckeltrical wires and cashiers any wizard could break in with a single spell. The only sizable collection of clothes left in the store, sprawled on the carpet in a stall of the fitting room, was an exhibition of Muggle and wizarding fashion history.

The store had been made for show from the start. No place with sufficient magic could sustain functional eckeltricity at the same time. The reverse was also true. But it was all too apparent as well that someone who had attempted to harness the two powers at once, as in the ridiculous futuristic stories that were so popular in WWN’s late night programming.

At least whichever Mad Wizards had tried this would have been close to St Mungo’s. Although, judging from the decades old clothing, St Mungo’s probably wouldn’t have known what to do with them at the time, and possibly, thrown them out for fear of eckeltrical infections.

Draco found the loose wire connected to Miss M and pulled it off. Then he did the same with her two glittery friends in the men’s department, who Draco had found under a collapsed shelf of cosmetic and had placed them by Miss M’s side.

Thank you, Miss M winked at him. Her friends’ eyes were still and unseeing, but their arms jerked like the arms of a clock, brought their hands to their mouths and blew Draco a kiss.

Draco laughed, shed the rubber housing and shaped the copper wires into a pair of flower corsages. He tied one on their left wrists.

He earned two extra kisses, one on each cheek.

Draco had chosen Art Deco style. The new carpet was a soft dove gray, which helped to conceal the dust accumulated through the years and his Scourgify might have missed. A square table made use of what had been the cashier counter, the two sets of plates on them the tiny cashiers, each with a window and a grid of numbered buttons, that Draco had found everywhere. He panelled and stained the inactive display windows, colour-matching them to the clothes on the mannequins. The shelves he’d found he folded and stretched to form in-wall columns, adorned with sunburst patterns that had once been electric fans hidden in the strangest corners of the store. The tablecloth and napkins with chevron imprints had come from the few blouses Draco could find. The chairs in their black lacquered finish were far cries from the rotten suit hangers they’d once been.

Miss M was beaming. Even though she’d kept her haughty visage, Draco could tell how wide her eyes had become, how her eyelashes were fanning in waves—while her friends, having missed her for long, were straightening her clothes, picking out the dust caught on her eyelashes and repainting her eyes—knowing, somehow, where touch-ups were needed without seeing a thing.

He had the dating spot designed and built. Next, Draco would need flowers, food and wine.

He wasn’t missing the most important element of a date. Not yet.

 

 

The corner storekeeper threw him a wary glance when Draco handed her the fifty pound note, which he’d found in a cashier machine. It could be his attire, still the silk robe he’d worn to the Ministry this afternoon, or his purchase, which included a dozen cups of Batchelor’s Super Noodles To Go (six Mexican Chilli, six Thai Green Curry).

Nonetheless, she was all smiles after he’d paid her and was nice enough to nod at a tray on a side and said “plastic forks over there”.

Walking back towards the entrance of the store, he was basking in the glow that had to be his Malfoy charm…

“The pyjama blokes… they’re easier than tourists,” the storekeeper whispered.

“Who walks around looking like this? Are they from a cult?” Another voice piped up, equally soft.

A snicker. “Their heaven has to be a hospital then—that’s the type of things they buy. Who bloody cares? Opening a shop here is better than winning a lotto...”

It was then Draco realized he’d forgotten to ask for change.

 

 

Steam rose from the cup before him. Draco dipped a plastic fork under the foil cover, checked that the content hadn’t turned into molten goo and tapped the noodle cake with it. He’d learned from the last three cups that the water could neither be too cold nor too hot, and the cake needed time to soften before it’d loosen into noodles (mortar and pestle grinding was NOT the way to go). Once he’d reached that step, he could do what Potter had done that day, perform the clockwise and anticlockwise stirs along with some jiggles.

He wiped off a drop of seat. He should have kept one of the eckeltric fans and spun the blades by magic.

His work in progress looked better this time. The water was a bit thick, however, as if he’d added a drop of freshly collected ooze from the Bundimuns. He stirred the noodle, remembering that there’s a packet of powder he’d need to add soon, sometime between the jiggles.

Speaking of that packet…where was it?

He looked around. Not on the table, not on the floor, not on his lap, his chair...

He’d spelled _Aguamenti_ just now, a heating spell for the water, then a charm for the kettle to pour its content into the cup on its own—Draco could do without another steam attack…

Draco banged his head against the table. The packet had to be still inside the cup... and he’d cooked it. How would he know if it’s still potent? That he hadn’t turned it into poison?

As he Banished yet another failure, he knew that behind him, Miss M’s eyelashes would soon fall off with glee.

Draco turned and glared at her.

Well, at least he had the support from her friends, who Draco had named Glitter and Sparkle. They’re sitting at the table beside him, their sequined coats glistening in the light from the frosted glass chandelier, as each patted the bunch of daffodils clipped between their fingers. Every once in the while, a sigh could be heard from the flowers, courtesy of Gilderoy Lockhart,—who everyone’d seemed to send the flowers to as "fan gifts"—their complaints about the health effects of “instant noodles” (which was nothing instant in Draco’s book) forgotten. Draco could have put them in the two cups of chocolate he had bought from the Spell Damage Ward, but they’d be gone before Potter had a chance to take a sip.

By midnight, everything was ready. The noodles were in warmed soup plates (no, they would not be served in their original containers; those cups clearly had a bad case of acne). The daffodils were blooming in a vase filled with water and pearly sequins, the latter freshly shaken from the cuffs of the two male mannequins.

All Draco needed was the one wizard to share it all with.

 

 

Potter, in a threadbare T-shirt and flannel boxers, leaned against the doorframe. He didn’t bother to stifle his yawn. “Malfoy. It’s 12:30 in the morning.”

“For your information, my bedroom is in this flat too,” Draco snapped back. In his defence, it was a habit. An instinct.

Potter raised an eyebrow. He was still squinting, his eyes yet to adjust to the corridor lights. “I can’t believe you,” he mumbled. “Back to bed.” He turned away and was ready to close the door on Draco’s face.

Managing to hold the door open just in time, Draco said, “You are my protective custodian. You’re supposed to keep me away from harm.”

Without turning, Potter raised his hand and offered Draco a finger salute. Behind the door, the ward Potter set up every night remained sealed. He seemed determined to ignore Draco, his feet already dragging him back to his bedroom.

“How will you write the report if I’m attacked tonight?”

His steps slowed, Potter replied, his voice still steeped with sleep, “My charge was a suicidal dildo. It’s in the case file.”

Draco couldn’t see Potter’s face, but he could hear a snicker.

 _Suicidal Dildo Draco._ Merlin, that’s even catchier.

And did Potter say he’d already immortalized the alias in the Ministry records?

“A dildo’s function is to plunge itself into arseholes.” A logical approach, Draco’s mind had determined without his input, was his only hope to clear his name “Relatively speaking, jumping off buildings is a breeze.”

Potter stopped then and turned to face Draco, his eyebrows raised to incredulous arches. “What?” he asked, before rubbing his face with his palms. “This has to be a funny dream,” he muttered to himself. “’Night, Malfoy.”

His journey back to slumber was about to resume when a brisk flip-flop flip-flop scurried down the hallway.

Draco barely had time to assess the noise behind him when an old lady, dressed in a night robe, slippers and oversized hair curlers, examined him from head to toe. She was tiny, had more wrinkles than a sopophorous bean but her smile was huge. Bigger still were her display of gold teeth, her hair curlers and the pair of spectacles she was wearing, which would have put Trelawney’s to shame. “You’re here! Finally!” she exclaimed. “To ask for Harry’s hand, right? Right! I know you two—”

A tug on the elbow pulled Draco inside the flat and the door slammed shut behind him. “She says she’s a seer…” Potter explained, before he stopped himself. “She’s—” A faint blush crept to his cheeks and he ran his fingers through his hair. “She’s, um, she’s mental. See the soda cans in her hair? She said they’ll be in style …” He rambled on, his eyes avoiding Draco’s as his hands gestured all over the place.

A fazed and yet-to-wake-up Potter was a good, safe Potter to ask for things.

“I need you for a date,” Draco said, not unaware of how tactless, how… Pottery he sounded. “With me.”

 

 

One thing that the Brits, Muggles and wizards alike, would agree on was the importance of tea. It’s so important, in fact, that in the presence of teapot, even an empty one—Draco’d Summoned it from the cupboard the moment he’d made his request—Potter had respected it as the National Emblem of Concord refrained himself from hexing Draco into pieces. He made himself comfortable on the sofa instead, listening to Draco’s story about the mannequins as he woke to the smell of imaginary tea.

It’s strange, talking while hugging a teapot, but Draco was doing something unfamiliar as well—he’s recounting an event as it’d happened, without embellishments and supplemental dramatics.

Time was tight. Draco and Potter had noodles to eat.

Whether it was because of the token of peace in his arms or his barebones speech, Potter had seemed more attentive to Draco as time passed. He hadn’t taken Draco seriously at first—he’d rolled his eyes at Draco’s escape, he’d probably lounged on the sofa for a convenient spot to go back to sleep. But as Draco’s words filled the air, he’d become increasingly alert, maintaining silence as Draco went on.

“This is important to you,” Potter said, after Draco finished his last thought—

—that he, Draco Malfoy, who’d defied the Dark Lord (and deprived him of face cream), who’d gone head-to-head against Potter for more times than he could count, was defeated by a simple No. See. Love. from a mannequin.

He stood and headed towards his bedroom. “Give me ten minutes, Draco. Freshen up—you know where the washroom is.”

It was not until the bedroom door clicked closed when Potter added—an afterthought, almost. “Your manor’s back in Wiltshire.”

 

 

Draco had washed his face and made a detour to the master’s bedroom, empty and so … bereft with nothing but whitewashed walls and a scratched wooden floor. He had no idea why he’d gone there, what he’d been looking for—until he’d seen the spare key lying in the corner of the room, where he’d dropped it earlier that day.

The key jingled far too loudly in Draco’s pocket, so loudly that when Potter turned towards him in the entrance hall, he could have sworn Potter was reacting to distress call of the key held captive. But…

All was fair in the end—for Potter stole Draco’s breath away, right then and there.

He was wearing an Auror robe, but not the one that had been his daily uniform. Instead, the dress robe was the one reserved for formal functions, the one that, although the overall cutting must conform to Ministry standards, the details—the colour, the style and pattern of the cuff, trims, and inlays—were designed and custom made for the individual. Many of Potter’s contemporaries, eager to show off their tastes, had worn them in the public and had in turn been tarred and feathered by the Fashion Aurors—extra feathered, if they had put feathers on the robe themselves.

But Potter, whose dislike of dressing up was about as well known as his scar, had shown up in his work uniform even in the Ministry event of the year—the Order of Merlin awarding ceremony. The Style Watch page in _Witches Weekly_ had speculations and polls on the supposed look of his Auror dress robe filling up the corner spaces of every issue (which Draco did NOT fill out every now and then, in a magazine that he NEVER read).

Some readers had owled in letters to the editors, expressing doubts that Potter even had a dress robe to begin with.

And Draco could begin to guess why.

Maybe it’s because the robe was emerald green—a colour Draco would consider exclusive to Slytherins—and after the war, to the Lesser-than-Light side—until he realized Potter’s eyes owned that colour.

Maybe it’s because the fabric of the robe was even softer, even lighter. It flowed in the still air inside the flat as if a breeze had risen. There was Veela hair woven in it—Draco could tell from the way it shimmered, from the way it clung to the skin below, formfitting to the point of obscene—wearing pants underneath was certainly out of question.

“All right?” Potter asked, looking slightly uncomfortable as he studied the delicate embroidery on the cuffs. “First time wearing this.”

Draco only managed a curt nod. Miss M had more flexible joints than he had, at the moment.

Taking it as a sign of polite disproval, perhaps, Potter shrugged.

“I can use some help with this thing,” he then said, his arms outstretched and his palm blossomed to show a pewter shaded ornament. “Reckon you know how to do it.” He gestured at Draco’s collar.

Draco’s hand was shaking when he took the proffered object.

He folded the ornament in halves by magic. It resisted at first, sensing magic that did not belong to its owner, but acquiesced when it felt Potter’s proximity. Having clipped it onto the right corner of Potter’s collar, Draco’s held it in place with the warmth of his flesh. Soon, the low-key but intricate design of the letter “P”, strung with vines and morning glories, began to embed itself in the fabric, replacing the Ministry insignia that Potter had removed.

“Where did you find it?” Draco’s voice carried a tremor as well. Was Potter aware what he had bestowed Draco? The honour—

“In the Gringotts vault…” Potter paused, watching Draco for just long enough to be noticeable “… from my Mum and Dad. It’s the only non-money thing inside.”

At the mention of Potter’s parents, a tendril of shame coiled up in Draco’s stomach. It would have drained the blood, the colour from his face and hands if not for the warmth under his fingertips, from the ornament that only someone as clueless as Potter, who had friends as clueless as the Weasleys, would call a non-money thing. “Do you have the slightest idea what this non-money thing is?”

Potter nodded at the serpent that framed Draco’s collar, dipping at the centre and upward to frame his jaw line on both sides, a ‘M’ spread to rest upon the hem. “Family emblem. Status symbol. Represent the Head of the Family in events the bloke’d rather stay home for. Whoever carries it speaks for him.”

The metal began to cool in Draco’s hand. He could still feel its hardness, but its weight was lifting, buoyed by the family’s magic in its vicinity.

“If I got this earlier,” Potter said with a smile, “it would have gone to Snapes’ classes for me.”

“Who would carry it for you? Granger?”

Potter thought for a moment, then shook his head. “You,” he said. “I’d get house points too every time you answered right.” He rolled his eyes at the last word.

It would be the moment for Draco to tell Potter that, for a Head of the Family to give his brooch to another Head of Family, it signified a lifetime of friendship, loyalty and servitude.

Well. Some day, he would.

The process complete, Draco parted his hand from the collar of Potter’s robe. Potter’s face was still tilted upward and sideways, leaving his neck exposed under the strong jaw line and the head of untamed hair.

It was now or never. Patience had always been a virtue in the eyes of every Malfoy, but certain things in life were spur-of-the-moment, one-time, one-chance affairs—such as offering an unreturned handshake that would pull two boys apart but bring their fate together at the same time…

Such as now.

Bending and leaning forward, Draco pressed a kiss on the Potter’s Adam’s Apple and traced a feather-light swipe along his throat with his lips. Potter’s throat bobbed wildly in response and when Draco straightened, Potter was looking at him, wide-eyed.

His mouth still wet from the kiss, Draco’s mind was already throwing him a litany of questions. Was it too rash? Was it the right thing to do? What about his past, his history...

“Let’s go,” Potter came to his senses first and whispered, his voice hoarse. Without giving Draco or himself any more time to think, he grabbed Draco’s arm, led both of them out of the flat and Apparated.

 

 

“She can’t remember.”

Potter leaned against the display window inside Purge and Dowse, as Miss Mannequin dedicated yet another round of eyelash fluttering to him. She was overjoyed to see Draco return and seemed to know who Potter was—the display window had opened for him without him having to say a word.

But somehow, she’d failed to connect the face before her as Draco’s date, the one he’d referred to as Potter throughout the evening. And she’d forgotten the incident that morning less than a month ago, the disappointment she’d experienced when Draco had waved the Quidditch Hunk of the Year centrefold before her.

The dilemma then, was this: should they break her heart first so that she could witness a date she’d dreamed of? But she wouldn’t want to see them date afterwards, would she?

Should they just let her binge on her infatuation with Potter? That would be easy—all they had to do was stay around for a while.

Or, should they be the sane, mature wizards that they were (right), forget all this and go home?

Potter tilted sideways to take in the scene behind the mannequin—the two-table restaurant in Art Deco style, Glitter and Sparkle sitting at one of the tables, their heads tilted towards one another and their arms bent to their casual wands-at-the-ready angle. Prior to leaving for Potter’s flat, Draco had seated them close enough to have a “conversation”, having realized they lacked the coordination to stand for a sustained amount of time.

“The place is fantastic,” Potter said. “Will it stay?”

Draco hadn’t thought about that. He hadn’t thought much about anything, really, including—

“What have you planned for the date?”

That.

All Draco had planned for the night was the noodles.

“Noodles!” The thought announced its presence without Draco’s consent. He’d forgotten what he’d toiled at for so long.

Potter stared at him for a moment, but a quick inspection around the room soon led his vision to the two soup bowls on the empty table.

“That’s the smell,” he said with a grin and sauntered towards the table, offering Draco’s eyes a delicious dinner that involved no noodles at all. “ I can use a snack.”

 

 

“They looked far better when I left them.” It was contemplation, his intellectual angst that emanated the sulk in Draco’s voice. Not his inner brat—absolutely not. Noodle Desperado, like Vanishing Cabinets, had a way of unleashing their Dark side when Draco wasn’t watching. He’d placed a cage of birds and some apples in the cabinet one evening and the next morning, he’d found a dish of roast fowl with apple confit. Tonight, he’d left noodle soup on the table and came back a few hours later to…. fat, string-like flour paste without soup.

Potter, too, was speechless for a moment. He eyed Draco, then the noodle, then Draco again, and the first thing he said was, “You cooked this?”

If Purge and Dowse had been Hogwarts, this would be the time when Draco would have drawn out his wand, spat a vicious and hopefully innovative insult, and fired. Potter would have followed suit and…

….not picked up a piece of noodle with his fingers, dangled it over his mouth and used his tongue to guide it into his mouth. He chewed it and swallowed it with a gulp, all the while beaming at Draco.

“Not bad,” he said.

“It’s sickening.” Although Draco would have tolerated the sight of Potter’s tongue licking the end of the noodle a while longer, even if he’d risk the possibility of Suicidal Dildo Draco Ogles Muggle Noodles turning up in the Ministry files. “And stop making fun of m… the noodles.”

“Not making fun of anything,” Potter said in all seriousness, but added a noisy slurp to suction another piece of noodle into his mouth. “Soggy instant noodle is a rite of passage.”

“To what?” Draco wasn’t feeling better just because Potter didn’t Banish the food right away.

“Muggle cooking.”

“I’m not a Muggle.”

“You’re cooking for a half-Muggle.”

“I’m not cooking for—“

Arm wrapped in front of his chest, Potter rested his elbow on the table and looked at Draco, daring Draco to finish the thought.

A thought that, of course, was too much of a lie for even a Malfoy to say out loud. It was outright deceit, a solid Level IV lie based on his family’s standards—three whole levels above The White Lie (Level I, II, III being wordplay, deceit by omission and deceit in details respectively).

Instead, he picked up his fork and twirled a piece of noodle around it. Silence was admission enough that he did cook for the prat. He pulled the noodle loose with his teeth and took a small bite.

At least the noodle could claim it didn’t engage in false advertisement. A post-war truthful reporting noodle through and through—it tasted as bland and gooey as it looked.

“Use your fingers. Tastes better.” Potter doled out his advice with mock gravity. Nonetheless, his shoulders had noticeably relaxed since Draco’d stopped denying that he had prepared the meal. He once again demonstrated his noodle slurping skill—this time picking a noodle from Draco’s plate.

“Malfoys have manners, unlike you.”

Rather than issuing a rebuttal (there was no way Potter would win that one), Potter, in his impeccable dress robe and his wizard family emblem on display, picked out the most misshapen piece of Muggle noodle and dangled it in front of Draco. Challenge glinted in his narrowed eyes.

They had the full attention of Glitter and Sparkle at the table beside them. Their heads huddled close together, both had their fingers pressed against their mouth, the awe in their gesture usually reserved for holidays sales events. The copper corsage bloomed on their wrists, a pair of flowers that covered half of their faces.

Meanwhile, Miss M’s gaze grazed upon Draco’s back. She was watching as well.

His arms outreached to hold on the two edges of the table, Draco leaned forward and caught the noodle in his mouth. He closed his eyes, but could still feel the jolt in Potter’s grip as his lips slid along the short length of the pasta, taking it in centimetre by centimetre. He had no need to lean forward, no need to bend further—Potter was yielding to his advance, his fingers that held the other end of the noodle tugged closer and closer towards Draco.

The noodle was almost gone. Draco could tell from the way it was tautening between his lips.

“Open your eyes,” he heard Potter said, an order spoken in more gasps than words.

Draco did, just when his lips made its first contact with Potter. He let his eyes wander all over the flush face before him as he kept pulling, taking in more—of the food, then, after he’d had finished the last bit, the fingers that had held the food for him, tasting the soup on the skin, nibbling as his tongue swirled against the tips.

“Draco…”

With a light pop, Draco let go of the fingers in his mouth. He picked up the napkin and dapped his mouth with it. “Wizards with proper etiquette don’t drop their food half-way,” he said.

“Yeah.” That was all Potter could say. Soon enough, however, he chose another piece of noodle and dangled it before Draco. This time, he let it swing—like a bait, like the pendulum of a grandfather clock, counting every second that passed by in this little game of theirs.

Draco clipped it with his fingers and placed it in his mouth, drawing it in.

“Remember what you said. No dropping your food half-way.” Potter was smiling and before Draco could roll his eyes, he inserted his end of the noodle into his mouth and began to draw it in from his side.

Meanwhile, Draco was petrified. The noodle between them would break soon, unless one of them lifted himself from the chair to close the distance.

He should have let it break. It was a piece of bad noodle, for Merlin’s sake.

But the way the heavy white suspended so precariously between them… Draco felt almost incarcerated in his own need to keep it from breaking.

And Potter offered no help. The gooey, messy link between them tautened further as he straightened his body a bit, playing the mirror image of Draco across the centre line of the table. Even in the soft gold of the candlelight and the sweet smell of the daffodils, the look behind the spectacles was recognizable—same as the one when Potter had approached Draco on a rickety broomstick, his hand reaching for Draco’s extended arm above the Fiendfyre…

Potter had made clear his intention, his willingness to come before him and offer all that Draco desperately needed and wanted, if Draco would reach out just as much, for it and for him—

—even if he was part of the past that Draco had tried so hard to move away from; even if the smudges that had sullied the Malfoy name had been the same ink that had glorified Potter’s deeds.

Draco stretched out his hand and cupped Potter’s face. As his fingers slipped forward and into the black hair, soothing it with his touch, he brought Potter’s face close to his own approaching one. They were breathing hard, the noodle still swinging between them as the movement of their lips reduced to a quiver.

Potter took in the remainder of the noodle between him and Draco in one smooth roll of his tongue, the tip of which then glided along the length until it reached Draco’s lips, where the noodle vanished into Draco’s mouth.

Proper wizards would never drop their food, would never let go of what they wished to taste. And as simple, as natural as that, Draco opened his mouth to receive the help for his noodle cleanup—

—which felt suspiciously like a kiss.

 

 

After all, none of the usual descriptions for a kiss applied. It was more salty than sweet. The red on Potter’s lips—and no doubt on Draco’s own—was much less likely the consequence of passionate bites than the scarlet essence of Noodle Desperado. Their tongue didn’t fight for dominance as much as they fought to detangle the food. They then devoured what they had in their mouths rather than one another, just to get it out of the way.

And when they finally separated, Potter’s hair was for once flattened, tamed by the pressure, the urgency delivered by Draco’s hand. Draco’s long blond hair, meanwhile, got a dye treatment with its ends dipped in the Green Curry noodle. The lovebird stare they should then share was replaced by a snigger, than a laugh that would bring lunatics to shame.

Potter had nice, white teeth.

It was all wrong—the details, the setting were more fitting for an episode of The Larger than Life Wizard of Wiltshire (extremely truthful reporting, that title).

Unless the two leads were Draco and Potter, who were just so wrong together.

Then, the kiss was just right.

Just perfect.

 

 

The daffodils let out a collective _Eeeeeeeee!!!_ as the vase swayed and toppled at the force of the crash against the table. Nothing could distract them anymore, not the sequins in the water, not the chocolate milk that’d spilled on their petal as it splashed.

“Merlin,” Potter whispered under his breath and made his way to Glitter and Sparkle, who had fallen on the carpet and brought the table with them. Draco joined him.

The mannequins raised one hand and covered their face when Potter and Draco helped them up. Their embarrassment was absolutely called for, for Potter and Draco had to pull their hand out from each other’s fly. Sparkle’s corsage was a bent mess of wires, sandwiched and crushed between their groins.

“It’s in the way,” Potter said, examining the corsage as if it’d been an evidence of a crime scene before spelling the wires back to their former appearance. “Who knew they’re so horny?”

Draco cast a mild _Wingardium Leviosas_ on the opened flies. He refused to touch the zippers, now that he knew the mannequins could feel … down there.

The magic tugged and pulled, but nothing happened. Draco glanced at Miss M behind them. Her eyes were cast sideways and downward, resolutely refusing to look.

Potter retrieved his wand and did the same spells. Still, nothing. He bit his lower lip, mumbled “no offence” and without waiting for any sign from the mannequins, held the tab of Glitter’s zip and pulled. Glitter waved his arm in what could only be described as a slow motion flail.

The tab wouldn’t budge. Potter made himself comfortable on the carpet, placed the mannequin on his lap and checked the teeth of the zipper. “Looks all right,” he said, more to himself than anyone else. He grabbed the tab, wiggled it a little and tugged it again.

Meanwhile, Draco heard a tiny sound from behind him. A whisper. When he turned around this time, Miss M was watching them, blinking.

The blinks were slow. One. Two. Three. _No. No. No_. Draco hurried over to her.

“Hurts.” Her whisper was so weak that Draco could barely catch the word. “Hurts,” she said again.

Potter, still on his knees, had stopped working on the trousers. “Apparently, her friend hurt when you pulled on the zipper,” Draco told him, to which Miss M blinked three times. Yes. He watched Potter, who was watching him with no doubt the same cracking-up expression on their face and the same thought in their minds.

Blue balls.

“This is one interesting date, Draco.”

Snickering, Potter glanced at Sparkle, who, sitting while propped against the surface of the toppled table, had lowered his head so his line of view matched Glitter’s on Potter’s lap. “Make it a double-date.” He stood, scooped Glitter up and sat the mannequin beside his friend. After rotating the corsage on Sparkle’s wrist to get it out of the way, he …

“Potter, this is obscene!”

Potter pushed up his glasses up the bridge of his nose, before further adjusting the position of the two crisscrossed arms and the two hands in the open flies. Satisfied then, he flashed a grin at Draco and cast a charm with his wand. The tabletop, still standing on its edge after the fall, grew and curved, forming a makeshift alcove that blocked the two mannequins from their view. “There. Privacy—”

At that moment, a shriek sliced the air in the room. “NO SURPRISE BUTT SEX ON HOSPITAL GROUNDS WITHOUT CLOSE SUPERVISION! INTERCOURSE SHOULD BE PERFORMED UNDER THE CARE OF A MEDIWIZARD—”

Another shriek chimed in then, this one hoarser but just as loud. “PATIENTS’ PENISES ARE POKABLE BY URETHRAL SOUNDS ONLY. NO COPPER—”

Potter and Draco raced to the table and threw the daffodils into the cups of hot chocolate.

It was not until the ring in his ears had subsided, replaced by the sound of slurping and _aaaaahhhhhhhs_ , that Draco noticed his body placement: Draco, having arrived a split second later to silence the flowers, had thrown himself against Potter, his chest pressed upon Potter’s back. Potter was bent at his waist, his torso sandwiched between Draco and the table.

NO SURPRISE BUTT SEX ON HOSPITAL GROUNDS WITHOUT CLOSE SUPERVISION.

He was not going to not supervise that arse closely if he had surprise butt sex …

“Um, Draco?” Potter asked, his tone husky with his neck craned backwards. His arse cheeks then gave a squeeze when he added, as demure as before. “Move. I’m faceplanting into the food.”

With Potter still captive beneath him, Draco retrieved his wand and Banished the bowls and cleared the table. He then flipped Potter—supple to the point of boneless—around to face him. As expected, the well-tailored robe on Potter showed no signs of wrinkling, its every seam as impeccable as before and the collar stiff and upright. But it was the latter—still adorned with the Potter emblem—that made Potter look more debauched than his wild hair ever could, from the way it framed Potter’s wildly bobbing Adam’s Apple to how its understated green brought out the flush on his face and his neck. Draco smoothed the robe with his hand, feeling the fabric soothe his fingers as they followed its flow down the side of Potter’s body, passed the dip of his waist, the jutting bone of his hip, the muscles on his thighs…

“Just so you know,” Potter spoke again. “Exchanges between us past this point…aren’t history. Aren’t unmentionables.”

It was a fair request. There would be no turning back if the exchange…would merge them into one.

But had there been any turning back in the first place? No matter how hard Draco had tried to sever the link to his past, it’d found its way to tap into his present. Like the Noodle Desperado, it wasn’t unbreakable not because it was anything less than a gooey, ugly mess, but because Draco hadn’t had enough heart to do it, because Potter was holding on to it on the other end.

And yet, as much as he wanted to brush Potter’s warning off his shoulders, its weight still bore upon his body, stiffening, straightening it, until his balance was so lost that he could do little but to plant his feet on the carpet.

Until he moved up and away from Potter.

The corner of Potter’s lips twitched. He sat up and hopped off the table. “Miss M saw what she wanted,” he said, nodding in the direction of Glitter and Sparkle with a smile. “They’ll remind her everyday. Thanks for the date, Draco.”

He walked to the display window, which Miss M opened for him before he’d made a request. Draco watched him Disapparate and vanish under the streetlamp.

Meanwhile, Miss M’s eyes were intent upon Draco, their blue penetrating him to join the blues welling inside him. Once Draco turned and she had his attention, she blinked in a series of five, tentative in every open and close, open and close…

 _Why_?

 

 

 


	8. Dance like Nobody is Watching

**~* July, 1999 *~**

  

 

> “I’m skipping the pleasantries, Potter, because an appropriate one for us would involve a punch on your nose, which my Eagle owl, having read too many an issue of _The Daily Prophet_ and _Witches Weekly_ , had refused to deliver one on my behalf.
> 
> Several weeks ago, I came across a detailed map and floor plan of your childhood home. It’s of no surprise to you as much as it’s to me, I reckon, that a former Death Eater headquarters should carry something like this.
> 
> I used those parchment as a blueprint and in the package is the product of my spare time, as well as a heap of inedible chocolates I found in the manor. They’re the Dark Lord’s favourites and he’d left them there, just so you know, but they’re harmless. Professor Snape had purchased them from the Muggles across the ocean and we’d all had some, seeing that they’re the staple of Voldemort’s nightly parties. The _we_ included the loony Ravenclaw that was your friend. I used to sneak a few in her dinner while she was here, seeing she wasn’t fed much. She wasn’t poisoned, as the weekly horror known as _The Quibbler_ could attest. The only real danger about them was that they were possibly the worst tasting chocolates known to mankind. They share more of a kinship with Bubotuber pus than with any type of sweets. Even Goyle wouldn’t touch them after having one (he’s still alive as well).
> 
> If _The Prophet_ has adhered to the Truthful Reporting policy, the Ministry has beaten you to purchasing the plot of land that had once been No. 4, Privet Drive. For your safety, I’ve heard. The arson reeked of Dark magic—I, too, believe that it’s committed by your enemies at large—and Shacklebolt and your MLE friends knew you’d have done the same, against better judgment.
> 
> Although I’d call preserving a piece of my home—even if it’s a pile of charred wood, of no-so-happy memories—not too shabby of a judgment.
> 
> Hence, I’m sending you this chocolate model of your old home. I have no further use for it. Magical design is my current hobby and this is just one of the things I have built and rebuilt, using every material I can get my wand on. I reckon you may want to have it for keepsakes.
> 
> I’m deciding whether to work on the interior. If the product may interest you, send me an owl.
> 
> The only thing I’m asking for is this: no one will know about it except you and I, nothing will be exchanged between us except the chocolates and the messages that accompany them—seeing that they came to you from an ex Death Eater, seeing that I’m a certified nutcase still living in a house that had once housed the madman who’d brought it down—not by its bricks and stones but its name, its honour.
> 
> Seeing that you’re part of the history that I’d like to leave behind, that I need to leave behind.
> 
> Feel free to destroy the house if you don’t want it, don’t trust me, or both.”

 

 

*~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~*

 

**7\. Dance like Nobody is Watching**

 

The streetlamp blinked several times before its spilled its light on the pavement—not that everyone noticed except Draco, leaning against the post as he watched the wizards come and go. They heeded no attention to his presence, too busy ooohing and aaahing at what greeted their eyes behind the admission mannequin. The filthy mess that had once been Purge and Dowse had become a splendid entrance hall for the hospital, with glass chandeliers and grand pillars and elegant motives and even a table or two, great for tea should any duelling parties feel so inclined to make temporary peace before signing in (not a bad idea, considering they could be bedridden for days). It was worth a visit in the uneventful post-war world and a headline in every news media, as proven by the assortment of reporters who had stationed here every evening, taking photographs, interviewing the passersby for their opinions. The spokesman of St Mungo’s had denied any involvement at first, but as days had gone by and the hall had exhibited no signs of mischief, the hospital had begun to tone down its stance.

In no more than a month, Draco thought, the hospital would take credit for the renovation.

Not that he cared. There were more worrisome things in the horizon, no least before his eyes. He studied Miss M’s face, ashen with the grime on the faded beige and the dust on the cobwebbed eyelashes. The blue of her pupils was so chipped that in the lamp light, it looked white and eerie like a vengeful ghost’s. Her summer dress was filthier than ever before, blotches of yellow showing up on the cotton like stains of rust or sewage water.

It didn’t matter that Glitter and Sparkle had cleaned her up before Draco’s date with Potter. It didn’t matter that Draco had since placed the two men barely out of the display windows’ view, so that they could approach her at night and perform the grooming routine. The Scourgifys Draco had cast on her after dark had made no effect. Draco had even tried to clean her up with the Muggle wash cloth and detergent he’d bought, after exchanging a few Galleons to British Pounds at Gringotts and earning more than a few suspicious looks from the goblins (more suspicious that what they’d usually looked anyway).

 

 

Every cleaning method worked at the time of its application—Miss M’s skin shone towards the end of each night, her eyelashes looked raven black and the azul in her eyes richer than velvet. She winked at him and her mannequin friends in appreciation before looking out of the window once more, as if eager for the new day to come.

But then, when the first hint of twilight broke through—Draco had actually stayed overnight in Purge and Dowse to catch that moment—she began aging as a mannequin would. Dirt clung to her like nails to magnet, dust weaved its net on her eyelashes and in her hair until she looked no different than when the night had begun.

Worst, she seemed to forget everything about Draco, except the list of descriptions a lay wizard—or a history book—would use to define him: his name, a timeline of his involvement in the Second War, a stock adjective or two dedicated to his looks (blond, chiselled), his new career. What she had since learned about him as a person—as her friend who’d dropped by to talk to her and clean her up—never survived beyond sunrise, although she recognized him as someone she could trust, someone who was more than a stranger.

It’s as if… they had known each other years and years ago and she remembered nothing but a sketch of Draco—as a barely recognizable set of faded strokes, the hue of his heart almost as faint as monochrome.

Maybe it wasn’t a bad thing. She would have known about the wars and all the tragedies in Wizardkind that had made it into common knowledge, but forgotten the injured and the dead who’d laid at her feet. Her friends had no such luck. Two nights ago, Glitter had given up half way while he was touching up her face. Draco had found him leaning against the edge of the display window, dabbing his eyes with his hands.

Draco had handed him a piece of tissue—even if his face had remained frozen with a smile, even if he’d shed no tears.

From afar, the bell in a Muggle church tower sounded its first chime. Seven o’clock.

Miss M’s days in Purge and Dowse would be numbered if her time kept racing past everyone elses’—it didn’t matter how long she’d served the hospital. Time had stolen her from her own life, from the new home Draco had created for her.

If only Draco could change the clock ticking inside her body. If that’s impossible, if only he could counter its advance with reverse time magic—

—a clock that ran backwards.

Less than five minutes later, Draco was pounding on the door of Potter’s flat.

 

 

His face almost split with that smug, git-tastic grin, Potter shrank his camera and slipped it into one of the many pockets of his travel vest. The Polyjuice he’d taken was showing the first signs of fading. The tip of his blond hair was turning black, as though it’d been dipped in ink. He removed his duckbill cap, letting the streetlight illuminate the famous scar that’d been first to escape the potion’s effects.

“You play one convincing intern,” Draco mumbled, not pouting as he patted the dust off Miss M’s dress.

….He’d given up knocking on the door of the flat, only to turn around to a blinding flash and a blond boy grinning at him from behind the camera.

“Sir! You’re man by hospital! Me! Yevgeni Poporov! Reporter from Russia! Student!” The boy spoke with a thick accent and enough energy and sunshine to grow a cactus. He adjusted the Quick Quote Quill clipped on his ear. “I feel funny…you look knowing at entrance.” He then asked, with widened eyes and a hushed voice “was it you?”

Still grinning, Potter slipped his Quick Quote Quill and his notebook into another pocket. “You’re blinder than me,” he said. “I’ve watched you for days.”

“And why are you doing that?”

“Shacklebolt,” Potter replied, his grin subsiding, turning into what could be a slight pout. His now dark hair emulated a head-crouching porcupine entering attack mode. “His owl, in verbatim: _‘NDEs may use suicidal dildos for personal gains. The Ministry cannot tolerate this happening to one of its upstanding citizens. Your assignment isn’t over, Auror Potter.’_ Upstanding was underlined.”

“He wrote that?” Draco asked in horror.

Potter raised both of his hands in surrender—Don’t ask.

“What about when I went to work?”

“I was there. Followed you under my cloak, then camouflaged. It’s tiring to squat for hours.”

“Robinson’s?”

“That salesmen who’d refused to go away.”

Right. Draco remembered him. Very annoying. Very…Pottery.

“Harris’s?”

“The statue in the fountain. The marble fishes spat on me all afternoon.”

“Baxter’s?”

“The wind-cock.”

“The wind-cock?”

Potter nodded. “You’re coffering the ceiling. It’s close.”

So Draco played a dildo and Potter played a cock. The Fates were equal opportunity perverts, at least.

“Then… Thursday. The Jones’ residence?”

Silence.

“Potter?”

Potter chewed on his lips.

“Did you defy your boss’s order to watch over me?” Draco asked in a provoking drawl.

“One of the anal plugs in the bedside table,” Potter replied.

Draco burst into laughs. 

Potter quirked his lips. “Ask which one.”

“Fine, which one?—”

Then it hit upon him. He shouldn’t ask. Potter couldn’t be…

Potter raised his eyebrows at him, the smug grin returning in full force.

Merlin and his pant’s dragon. Draco had only studied that one for a… short moment. He didn’t stroke it or look all over the packaging to figure out its maker.

 

 

Potter said no more. Rethreading the loose button on the denim jacket he’d just placed on her, he switched topic to their mission for the night. “I suppose the two blokes can watch the hospital entrance?”

The display window disappeared and reappeared. The two male mannequins, propped against the wall beside them with Sparkle’s head on Glitter’s shoulder, twisted their wrist and gave a collective thumbs up: yes.

“We should put them here after we take her down,” Potter said, tapping on Miss M’s swivelling stand with his foot. “They’re the new displays. Are their flies—?”

Draco nodded. “Still open.” He found the screw that held Miss M’s torso to the supporting rod, undid it and placed it aside. For fear of Splinching her body, they were using minimal magic to detach the mannequin.

“So they’ll wear an extra pair.” With her supporting rod gone, Miss M swayed on her feet and fell into Potter’s embrace. He patted her back in comfort, then swung her legs on his arms and carried her to join her friends.

Potter’s biceps rippled under his shirt. Draco wondered how it would feel if those arms were carrying him instead—as Speccy Git had always done, after a victory against the Horny and Unclean…

“There’s nothing here they’d want to wear,” Draco said. One didn’t need to be a Muggle to know that tracksuit bottoms and sequined jackets never mix. “But I have a better plan. They’ll thank me for it.”

 

 

“Arms higher and more towards the back. No, not him. Him! Wait! Too much!”

Draco wiped his face with his palms. For once, he had St. Potty under his command and instead of having Potter slave for him, he was doing most of the physical labour by stamping his feet—jumping mad—under the streetlamp. Potter was manoeuvring the two mannequins, already fastened to the supporting rods and aligned to face one another. A perfect gancho, Draco had envisioned for the new display, a snapshot of a fiery tango, in which the dancers were connected along their upper thighs, their hips … and their open flies. Glitter, playing the lead, would have his arm wrapped around the waist of Sparkle, whose one leg would hook around Glitter’s thigh and his other stretched all the way back, whose head would tilt upward for a longing, smouldering look at his partner.

As certain and as predictable as sunrise, Draco’s only problem had turned out to be Potter. The quick lectures Draco had given him about lines, toe pointing and elegance had bounced off the bespectacled skull as if it’d been Trelawney’s crystal ball—as thick and as fuzzy. Given the display window’s function was to shield against intruders and their magic, once he’d stood outside, Draco couldn’t move the limbs with the accuracy he needed.

But handing Potter that responsibility, even if Potter’s magic was so strong, so refined that he could tilt every arm and leg exactly the way he wanted—

It was a lost cause. Hands on his waist, Draco exhaled and combed back his long hair, blown loose in the night wind. He was pacing up and down the pavement, venting off his frustration, when Potter exited the storefront and stood by the lamp post.

“Show me?” He grabbed Draco’s wrist and stopped the pacing—of Draco’s footsteps, of Draco’s heart. As he made his request, his one leg slid backward and his hand, there to hold Draco captive just seconds ago, loosened and retracted, before it rose to the space between them, its palm open and facing Draco.

 

 

Under the streetlamp, the man standing face-to-face with Draco, even in his ugly vest and broken jeans, could only belong to a dream. Potter’s gaze burned with the intensity that should not be possible in the haze of the light, which filtered through his wild hair and blurred his outline.

Draco took the proffered hand.

“Tango is a dance of dominance.” Draco’s voice sounded far, far away. “The man leads, the woman follows—only because she trusts him enough to surrender. Here... Over there, Glitter plays the lead.”

Like a spark, the hesitance in Potter died off as quickly as it came. He pressed forward against Draco, his torso flexed to a slight crescent as he hooked his arm around Draco’s neck, mimicking the pose of the mannequins in the display window. At Draco’s stagger, his snickers were soft and breathless.

“You can’t just drape on your partner like that.” The reprimand from Draco was as feather light, as insubstantial as Potter’s laughs. “Midline-to-Midline, chest-to-chest.” In illustrating his point, Draco didn’t notice he’d pulled Potter yet closer to himself, their noses about to touch. “Then,” he swallowed, looking straight at Potter when the ground was fascinating to examine, with its bumps and stubs of used fags, “look over my right shoulder.”

“I can’t _midline_ you and lean to the right,” Potter protested, but with little venom or fire. He rotated his body a little to find a better position, but soon he gave his head a shake and muttered, “that’s not chest-to-chest.”

Draco took a breath. “Well, try your best. Usually…” he stopped. Potter was studying his face, willing him to carry on. “Usually, the cheeks are touching.”

“Right.” Draping himself upon Draco one more—it’s for the best, Draco realized, as their expressions became hidden—, Potter nudged his face to the right until it brushed against Draco’s. “Like this.”

“Yes,” Draco found himself mimicking Potter’s move, feeling the soft skin and the stubble. “Correct.”

Potter must feel Draco’s heart pounding against his own chest, as Draco could feel his doing the same thing on his heart. “And then?”

“Glitter and Sparkle are doing a gancho. It’s an interruption of their steps—it’s tension, it’s trying to stop… what is meant to be.” He closed his hand tighter against Potter’s. “Imagine Madame Hooch trying to break us up after a Quidditch game.”

Potter chuckled against Draco’s ear. “Because Slytherins are cheats.”

“More like Gryffindors are sadists.”

Potter turned his head slightly, smelling Draco’s hair. “The Slytherins gag for it.” His reply was so soft that Draco almost thought he’d imagined it, but a trickle of warm breath lingered upon his nape.

“What I want is this—” Draco continued, realizing that, he… concurred “—the one who follows, that’s Sparkle, that’s you,—” Draco’s arm circled against Potter and gave his waist a squeeze “—stealing the dance move from the lead. The lead ignores it and moves on. If he allows room for it, the tension would look weak. Artificial.”

Potter straightened in his arms as he took in the instructions. “And no kicking or lifting your leg on your part. Your leg should end up where it wants to be as part of the step. The idea is, even the attempt to stop what’s meant to be… is meant to be.”

Draco closed his eyes—which he knew was customary for the follower and never the lead—slipped his hand and splayed his fingers under Potter’s thigh. “So, if we’re moving, the pivot from your last step should swing your leg against mine.” He pushed upward and Potter lifted his leg accordingly until Draco relaxed the shove from his hand. “It will strike me like this, your inner thigh wrapping against my left leg like you’re about to straddle me.” He reached back and gently bent Potter’s knees until it hooked around his own leg. “There.”

Potted nodded. The shade of his face was the colour of Gryffindor—

—while Draco probably looked as green as Slytherin, considering the sheer nerves overwhelming his senses.

“Finally, your other leg.” The quiver in Draco’s voice should have no place here too, when he was the one playing the teacher. “You’ve stretched it back. It should align perfectly with my left leg. Point your toes so that only their tip touches the ground. Then look at me in the eye.”

Potter hesitated.

“You’ll be covered,” Draco said. He should be calling Potter and himself the follow and the lead, but that would require cerebral facilities he no longer possessed. “We won’t fall on our arse. I’ll make sure of that—even though you’ve made the first move. Because you’ve made the first move.”

His face was nuzzling Potter’s all along, Draco noticed—or possibly, the other way around, or both. The soft glow bathing the pavement reminded Draco of the old theatres along Knockturn, its stage empty but lit after the war by wizards who remained terrified of the Dark.

He and Potter were in this play, in this act that nobody could see, that nobody would remember.

Who knew how much time—how many seconds, how many minutes—had passed when Potter finally lowered his leg and detangled himself from Draco. “Thanks. I know what to do now,” he said simply, the corner of his lips lifted for a half smile.

Draco assumed he was referring to Glitter and Sparkle. Although Draco, too, had decided on what to do, what he wanted as well.

And it had nothing to do with mannequins.

 

 

 


	9. Hickory Dickory Dock

**~* May, 1998 *~**

 

“You gave it back to him?” Coiled up in the armchair and his eyelids drooping by the minute, Harry asked Shacklebolt, who had just entered the Gryffindor common room. The swept-in air, heavy with the smell of ashes and blood and war, usurped the lingering scent of soap on Harry’s skin.

The Auror nodded. “Still up?” he asked, taking a seat on the ottoman beside Harry’s armchair. You should sleep. Are Ron and Hermione already in bed?”

“Yeah,” Harry replied, his voice subdued to barely a whisper. The excitement from the battle and the victory was draining away, the trickle fast becoming a flood that could break the strongest dam. He laid his head on the armrest, which bathed in the morning sunlight of early May. “I reckon you’ll come back to check on us. What’s happening down there? In the Great Hall?”

“Almost clear. The wounded are in the infirmary or St Mungo’s and the professors have retired to their chambers. The cleanup will be much more efficient when everyone regains their energy. It’s just the Aurors and the Death Eaters now.” Shacklebolt sighed. “ The Ministry is in chaos. Voldemort’s lower henchmen are fighting, trying to break out. We can’t bring people back there yet.”

“What are you going to do with them?”

“That will be the first trial of the post-war world,” Shacklebolt squinted at the rays of light streaming into the tower through the ring of windows. His eyes were red from smoke and exhaustion, the cracks in the white violent against his calm. “How will we treat our enemies now that we are the victors?” He nodded, his voice low as if speaking to himself. “At least we’re off to a good start. We’ve refrained from casting Unforgivables on them—which many of us would rather do—and are warding up Slytherin so they ‘ll have a place to sleep. They’ve even had a meal—Muggle food, but better than the fat and sugar we’ve fed you kids.”

Harry smiled. After the fall of Voldemort, the professors had opened the safe haven in the Great Hall, prepared and hidden years ago for fear of a Dementor’s attack. The ceiling had rained chocolates soon after, their wrappings translucent until they’d met the hands of the students, on which they’d morphed into the colours of their house. In the morning light, The Great Hall had soon become a brilliant sea of red and gold—the latter hue shared by the Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs—, dotted with patches of royal blue here and there.

But the emerald green that had always captured Harry’s attention had been missing. A welcoming sight if this had been the celebration of who’d won the House Cup, but …

Harry hoped he had remedied that. He hoped that, in an obscure and magically-fortified corner of the Great Hall, there had been a small heap of green and silver on a pair of hands, on pale skin covered with grime and burnt marks….

“Having to buy the food was unexpected.” Shacklebolt smiled and went on to elaborate. Harry realized he probably needed a simple but human conversation as much as Harry did. “The kitchens were in shambles and the house elves were off to their own parties. When we last saw them, they still had all the energy to spare. We should have trained our people by making them feeding a school of teenagers.” He chuckled with a fond headshake. “We’re not about to call them back. They deserved their fun. So a few of us went to the closest Muggle town…”

He trailed off, untied the moleskin pouch wound around his wrist and pulled out a white pellet. Ending its shrinking charm, he handed a paper-wrapped cylinder to Harry. “Speaking of which, this is for you.”

Tugged away before between his head and the armrest, Harry’s fingers were numb when he received the package. The parchment rustled as his hand shook. “What is this?”

“Mr Malfoy’s token of gratitude. He wanted to thank you for ‘returning his wand, saving his life … and everything.’ Those were his words.” The Auror sighed and added, “He also said, he wished he’d have the time to do this right.”

Harry straightened on the armchair and placed the gift on his lap. Slowly, he tore open the cellotape that held the wrapping in place and peeled the layers of paper apart, like petals of a makeshift bouquet. The size, weight, the feel were all familiar. Harry would have no problems guessing what it was if not for Draco being the sender, if not for this time, this place…

Indeed, soon he was staring at a roast beef sandwich, its bread soggy, its lettuce and meat flattened to an unsightly mess.

Did Draco not know that food was the most valuable commodity for a soon-to-be prisoner? He had seen torture in the manor. Voldemort would have mistreated the hostages, would have starved them…

“It’s his lunch,” Shacklebolt said lightly. “Mr Malfoy insisted you have it. It’s probably the second best thing he still had, he said—right next to the Slytherin chocolates he’d found in the box with his wand.”

 

 

 

*~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~* *~*~*

 

**8\. Hickory Dickory Dock**

 

The Fairgrounds were deserted, being so late in the night when Draco and Potter arrived, Miss M shrunk and asleep in one of many yet-to-be-filled pockets of Potter’s vest. The stench of sulphur permeated the air, remnant from the midnight fireworks.

“You think she’ll like it here?” Draco asked, when once again the two of then stood before the clock in the corner of the grounds, lit by the fires of the phoenixes.

“She’ll let us know.” Potter found Miss M, wrapped in the napkin that’d been made for their date in St Mungo’s, and propped her against the same face of the cast iron tower where Potter and Draco had kissed. He then nodded at Draco.

“ _Finite Incantatem_.” Draco terminated the spell with a wave of his wand and closed his eyes. Everything—the clock, the mannequin—affected him for reasons he could not explain, for reasons that nonetheless were unbearably heavy, like shackles bound his ankle that would plant him to this forgotten corner of the Fairgrounds forever.

A pair of arms lifted his shoulders, enveloping him with an embrace from his back. Draco let it calm him. Comfort him.

“Look,” Potter finally said.

Draco took a deep breath and opened his eyes.

The first thing Draco saw was…what he was used to seeing in the past few years. The cast iron relief. The giant face of the clock with numbers written in Roman numerals.

Then he saw what Potter had wanted him to see. Miss Mannequin, in her summer dress and faded denim jacket, was standing in front of the clock. Her body looked softer in the light. So did her face, as if the plastic had flowed and sculpted with the haughty features an expression of wonder and hope.

Then, she moved. Every jerk of her limbs was slow and stiff, far more awkward than Glitter and Sparkle’s, but the clock seemed to offer her strength as time passed. She caressed the rim of the timepiece before one of her hands crept upward, her fingertip just tall enough to be brushed by the seconds hand.

The seconds hand approached. Step by step, it swept counterclockwise for yet another revolution into the past, until…

They touched.

The second hand bounced off Miss M’s finger, as if the mannequin’s flesh was stronger than steel. It then shuddered, shaking violently but unable to resume its march.

It was stuck—just like the hour hand pointing at twelve, a stillborn at its inception.

Meanwhile, Miss M froze as well. Her fingertip remained pressed against the clock, her long black hair flew in the wind as the blue of her eyes reflected the seconds hand that couldn’t decide which way to go.

And Draco, too, was petrified, staring at her from the sidelines …up to the moment when a wand found itself in his fist, made at a time unknown to his thoughts. He could almost hear his neck cracking like a mannequin’s as he turned to look at Potter behind him.

What Potter had given Draco was his own holly wand.

Potter nodded against the clock. “It’s up to you,” he said, letting go of Draco from his arms.

Draco remained glued to the ground. “Do it for me, Potter.” He heard his drawl, so cold in every word to hide the tremor hidden beneath.

Potter shook his head. “It’s your clock.”

Draco was about to protest—he had no idea what to do—when Potter added, simply. “You have my wand.”

The clock was shuddering, tense in its indecision. As Draco approached its face, he could hear the teeth in its cogwheels gritting louder and louder—and as they did, they seemed to gnaw away the new life the mannequin had just gained by leaning on it. Miss M’s body was, once again, immobile, a piece of dead plastic. In the breeze, the hem of her summer dress crashed against her thighs like waves against a rock. Her outstretched hand was slipping downward…

A phoenix on the clock tower burst into flames. In the light, Draco could see dust flying before her eyes, caught in her eyelashes as they stole the glimmer that was her away.

Perhaps, if Draco had more time to think, he would have recast a Tempus, the spell he had twice cast in his life—once on this giant clock in the Hangleton Fairgrounds, once on the chocolate cuckoo clock in the dining room of No. 4, Privet Drive.

Twice he had relied on magic to tell him time. Twice it had failed him.

This knowledge from within him told him what to do—or what couldn’t be done. Instead, he raised the wand in his grip—Potter’s holly wand—and nudged the seconds hand.

The hand bent and snapped back to its stuck position. The tip of the wand wasn’t thick enough for Draco to deliver the strength needed to move the hand.

He tried again and again, desperate to make the hand march forward—

A weight fell upon his right shoulder, solid and unyielding. He caught it, his free arm wrapping around it by reflex and the lifeless eyes of Miss M stared at him, her face stuck in the forlorn expression she had had when she’d said No. See. Love less than a fortnight ago.

Draco would have shrieked if not for another arm wrapping itself around him at this moment, if not for a hand—too calloused to belong to a Junior Auror—that held and covered Draco’s wand-bearing one with its palm. Draco could feel Potter’s hair brushing against his cheek as he rested his chin on Draco’s shoulder, every strand soft as it was wild. He could feel Potter’s body heat on his back, his heart beating in a steady rhythm that paced Draco’s own. He let Potter lift his hand upward, until the wand was pointing at the root of the second hand, near the wheel shaft where the hours, minutes and seconds meet—

“ _Diffindo_.”

At Potter’s command, the seconds hand snapped. The needle somersaulted in the air, as if the Severing Charm had unleashed a spring that catapulted it into the skies. It fell and landed like a miniature silver sword, its tip buried in the soil beside their feet. The remaining stub on the clock, set free by the break, hesitated for a second and made its first step forward.

Potter lowered their arms, but didn’t let go of Draco’s hand.

When Draco finally turned towards him, he found Potter watching the clock, lost in its tick-tock, tick-tock with the most simple, most content smile on his face, dampened neither by his scar showed under his fringes, airborne in the night wind, nor his ever present spectacles slipping down his nose.

It was Draco’s turn to stare and lose himself, for the next thing he noticed, Potter was watching him, his head hanging over Draco’s shoulder from behind, his face tilted and his breath warming Draco’s skin. He blinked as time passed, a living timer counting the seconds for Draco to return from his thoughts.

“I broke it. Not perfect anymore,” he said. “Sorry.”

 To that, Draco tilted his head to match the angle of The Thick-skulled One and pressed his lips against the other pair. Potter chuckled under his breath and leaned in to deepen the kiss. Their positions could not be more awkward—Potter remained standing behind Draco and both had to crane their necks, whether it was to nibble on the other’s lower lip or to taste the inside of the other’s mouth with his tongue.

Draco could almost hear a giggle. Then, something propped against his other shoulder, pushed in as if it was…snuggling. Draco noticed that he wasn’t carrying half of the weight on his other arm as he had had before. Straightening, he broke the kiss and—

—Potter stretched his body forward to chase his mouth. “We have an audience,” he said. “We’ll show her.”

His curiosity piqued, Draco turned to look. _Ah-Choo!!!_ A dust bunny hopped on his nose and he sneezed. The air was filled with them and it took no time for him to discern the source. Still wrapped in his other arm was Miss Mannequin, who had balanced herself on her tiptoed feet. Her neck was bent to the maximum angle—Draco could see the black crescent that was the joint—and her head, resting on Draco’s shoulder.

That had to be the semi-snuggle he’d felt a moment ago.

“Awww,” she cooed when Draco’s eyes met hers. “Love.”

In his other ear, he heard a chuckle before tiny bites travelled their way down along his ear shell.

“I’m afraid you’ve mistaken, Miss M,” Draco said, certain that his pathetic effort to suppress a grin was as Hufflepuffian as the lemon yellow signs in the Fairgrounds. “This stranger just happens to enjoy gnawing on my things, like as my nerves and…”

The nibbling stopped, replaced by a long, wet lick on Draco’s earlobe.

Draco didn’t take in a sharp breath. The serpents on the clock didn’t respond to the hiss and turned their heads, but their tongues flickered in earnest when they caught sight of the pretty mannequin in Draco’s arm. The phoenixes, who saw Miss M in no time as well, preened their feathers, using their burning companions for tanning beds to enhance their hue.

Miss M would have an interesting time here, if she’d decide to stay. This clock tower could be her new home and if she’d like a job, Draco could build a cuckoo for which she could open the doors at every hour. The creatures pining over her at the moment could keep her company...

One day, perhaps, she would experience what she had so wished to see and learn by heart.

Her gaze, meanwhile, had remained fixed on Draco and Potter. Her blue eyes were clear as crystals, so bright that they could light up the murkiest corner of every mysteries in the world, the most incomprehensible among them being—

—“Love,” Miss M insisted. “You.” She gestured at Draco, her movement slow and stiff. Screeches sheared the still, warm air and rust poured from the cracks between the joints when one of her arms jolted, swung sideways in its most aggressive motion yet to wave at Potter—“Him”.

“We—”

The sound, which had to be a giggle, rang again.

“Noodle,” Miss M whispered. Then, as if determined to make herself clear, she gestured at Draco and repeated the word again. “Noodle.”

Then she added, “Fail.”

A snort, then laughs burst out from the git beside Draco.

Glares were not equipped to shoot daggers in multiple directions, Draco realized, unless the cross-eyed look was in season.

“You may need _Obliviate_ ,” Potter suggested, his tone light as fluff. He was still chuckling, his glee seeming to make an imprint on Draco as his lips pressed against Draco’s shoulders.

And his arms were wrapping themselves tighter still around Draco. “Isn’t it fantastic?” He asked with a grin. “She remembers—that evening, that date, that… you and I.”

Soft as Potter’s words were, Miss M caught them and blinked three times—yes—and winked and winked and winked.

_Thank you. Thank you. Thank you._

 

 

“Always wanted to try this,” Potter said.

Up on the Ferris wheel, the air was brisk and cool. Feeling the wind through his thin summer robe, Draco had sat beside Potter, rather than the other side of the passenger car, in a quest for body heat. That he could use a Warming Charm hadn’t occurred to him, and clearly not to Potter, who’d nudged at Draco to lean against him, to rest his head in the crook of his own neck.

Everything—the Fairgrounds, the Hangletons—were mere shadows below them, deserted by wizards and light from the street lamps, dimmed at this late hour of the night.

“There’s nothing out there.” Draco looked over Potter’s shoulder, having wondered for a moment if there’s something Potter could actually see on his side. The instructions to switch on the scenery for the ride—from the nightlights of Paris to the meadows in the Swiss Alps—were written in the scroll of parchment hanging on the door latch, but Potter had insisted that they looked at this… void.

“Yeah,” Potter replied, pensive, almost, in the way his face was tilted downward. “I don't think I can see the Eiffel Tower from the Little Whinging Harvest Fair.”

Draco pulled at an especially curly lock of dark hair clipped behind Potter’s ears. It sprung back. Draco pulled again. “What’s there to see? At the Fair?”

Potter shook his head and shrugged. “Nothing much,” he whispered, “a few streets around my house, the park on Magnolia. It was a tiny Ferris wheel. When I was a kid, I just wanted to see our house from up high.”

“Like when we’re flying?”

Potter nodded. His hand had slipped upward from Draco’s shoulders, reciprocating Draco’s toying with his own hair. “I wouldn’t think of myself on a broom, though. I’d be Batman, or Spiderman….”

Draco snickered.

Potter stared at him. “Wha—”

“So our ickle Saviour aspired to be a failed Animag—”

“They’re wizards?” Potter’s eyes widened, twinkling in the weak Lumos from their wands, clipped in the holder above their seats. Then he flopped back, shook his head and gritted his teeth, a portrait of … inane resolve. “Don’t tell me. Don’t ruin my childhood dreams.”

“You dreamed small,” Draco’s smile faded and he sighed. “Unlike me.” Straightening a little, he lowered his head and stared at his own hands, his fingers weaving against one another. “I wanted to run the Ministry, have my own army of masked wizards and well, you know—”

Potter slipped off the seat, knelt before Draco and cupped his face. “Shhh,” he said. For a while, they just looked at one another, their chest undulating in the same quick rhythm.

“I own you in the dreams department.” Potter continued then, drawing Draco’s face close as he whispered, “I wanted to be the boss of Grunnings Drills. I wanted Aunt Petunia to make me roast beef and chocolate cake. I wanted a house on Wisteria, the brick one that’s twice as big than No. 4 Privet, and I’d invite my uncle for tea. And in its garage…” Potter’s face was so close to Draco’s that Draco’s lips could almost feel Potter’s—the vibrations as he talked, the sweetness, the warmth. “In the garage, I wanted the flying motorcycle I’d dreamt about, so I’d go _vroom vroom_ around Little Whinging…”

“ _Vroom vroom_?” Draco’s renewed smile ruined his pathetic attempt of a frown. Before Potter could answer, he sealed his lips against Potter’s again and as the kiss deepened, he guided Potter up from his knees and wrapped his arms around Potter’s waist, pulling the other man towards himself.

The Ferris wheel, weathered in its years of constant revolution, creaked as their passenger car arched across the peak and began its descent. Potter lost his balance, his one knee planted itself on the seat beside Draco; his other soon followed.

By the time Draco tasted the inside of Potter’s mouth, Potter was straddling him, his arms encircling his neck. Their kiss, just like the messy, fragile Noodle Desperado, refused to break between them until Draco was about to faint—from the intensity, the asphyxiation…

“Gillyweed. We need that,” Potter said, panting and grinning, wiping his lips with his fingers.

“So that’s a _vroom, vroom_ ,” Draco replied, out of breath—out of mind, too, and happily so.

“’Suppose.”

“Then I dreamed even bigger,” Draco leaned forward and captured the mouth again. “My Father only punished me once in my life,” he said, sucking, nibbling Potter’s reddened, moist lips. “I was five, maybe six. I’d heard from Pans—that’s Parkinson for you— that there’s this boy who’d defeated the most fantastic, most powerful Dark wizard out there.”

He licked where he’d bitten, soothing the little pinches he’d made with his bites. “Like any child my age, I daydreamed about the battle and doodled it everywhere. I believed the word _POW_ appeared beside your wand. Voldemort’s said _OW_.

Snickering, Potter returned a light peck on the corner Draco’s lips.

“I would have got away,” Draco said, when Potter broke the kiss and watched him, “if I didn’t splatter silver paint on the boy’s hair, didn’t dress him in my favorite robe.” He dipped his head forward to rest his forehead against Potter’s. “When my Father found out, he didn’t scold me for the disrespect, but for leaving my drawings—my thoughts—lying around the manor. ‘We never know when the Lord will make an appearance’, he said. I’d be reminded of that over and over again until I entered Hogwarts.”

A sigh echoed Draco’s own, followed by a soft peck on his lips.

“I’d thank my Father for the lesson when Lord Voldemort with his anagrammed suitcases. I’d learned to be proper but impersonal. I’d learned to make sketches of POWs and Ows that’d made no sense to anyone except myself, like your portraits. I’d learned to scheme and plot, because my mind is my home, where every thought—good or bad, sensible or laughable—are free to roam. But I’d dreamed big, Potter. I’d dreamed of being you.”

Potter worried his lips. “Not the best choice,” he said.

“Eventually my dream did make an adjustment or two, such as downgrading Potter’s look to the actual specimen’s, such as having Potter on his knees—” Lowering his arms, Draco traced the curve of Potter’s thighs with his palms “—as you are at the moment. So all in all, I did all right.” He then brushed his mouth against the other, willing it to curve back to a smile. It did. “Pans once said, she never knew whether telling me about you was the best decision she’d ever made, or the worst.”

That question, Draco had found out didn’t have an answer.

“And I told her this: ‘if you know how much I know about the Goblin Wars, you’d think it’s absolutely worth it.’”

“Goblins?” The dark clouds on Potter’s face retreated. Sunshine seeped in from the green of his eyes. “What about them?”

“That was the punishment from my Father—to remember every single detail about the Goblin wars. It’d serve to know the people who run Gringotts, he reasoned. He was right.”

“That’s why it’s worth it?”

“Merlin, no,” Draco shook his head. Potter’s, linked to him by the forehead, shook as well. “It’s worth it, you see, because I was acquainted with Hodrod the Horny-Handed and Urg the Unclean.”

Potter stared at him.

Draco laughed. “I didn’t make them up. I swear, some Goblin historians got really bored recording their wars—and I don’t blame them—and they took the characters and wrote up better stories, which were great settings for the adventures of Draco Malfoy and the Speccy Git. I’m sure Professor Binns was hard…”

Potter moaned. “Ugh. I don’t need that image,” he mumbled. “So what did Draco Malfoy and the Speccy Git do?”

“Wouldn’t you want to know?” Draco quirked his eyebrows. “Most definitely, Potter,—” he spat the _P_ a little, for old time’s sake “—something horny and unclean…”

Draco caught his grave mistake before it’d even left his lips. His verbal ability must have taken a serious blow, being under the magical influence of Potter. Soon he would be talking in incomplete sentences, saying er and um, and calling a Pureblood aristocrat like himself a bloke. He was about to correct himself, say something else to distract and—

Too late. With mock severity, Potter spoke, already cracking up. “But I don’t do goblins.”

“Me neither.” Draco responded far too quickly. Potter broke into guffaws and Draco shoved him sideways, pressed him on his back on the passenger’s seat as he lay on top of him. “Because I’ve had someone else in mind.”

Potter, his hands lifted to grip the rail of the passenger car, grumbled something like “Finally.”

Draco nudged his thigh between Potter’s legs. Potter opened up for him. “Will this ugly travel vest Banish itself, so that I won’t have to touch it?”

“Not a chance,” Potter said, as Draco’s hands began to travel between their bodies, from their chest down to the abdomen, unbuttoning the vest along the way. As he did, Potter pushed his hips upward, pressing their two bodies together—an unspoken welcome to the touch.

“I want more light,” Draco said. The feeble glow from the wands was not nearly enough for him to appreciate the sight of Potter, of him ready and open for Draco to take. “I want to see you. Not a grey smudge that looks like you.”

… And make up for all the lost time, all the Present Draco had wasted to avoid the Past—the hours he and Potter could be gazing, staring, glaring at one another; the months he’d spent on the chocolate model of No. 4, Privet Drive, when he could have—should have—knocked on the door of Potter’s flat and thanked him in person—for returning the wand, for saving his life, for everything. For the chocolates—on the last day of the war, in the many owls Potter had sent him, packed with sweets he’d picked up from different corners of his world, at different moments of his life.

Chocolate.

Draco slithered over Potter’s body, reached for and grabbed the scroll of parchment on the door latch. He skipped the instructions for using stock sceneries and skimmed the final set of directions. “How much do you remember about Little Whinging?”

His eyebrows raised, Potter looked in equal parts amused, exasperated and sexually frustrated. His vest was open, the weight of its many pockets pulling it sideways to expose the simple white oxford underneath, tucked into a pair of faded blue jeans.

“Well?” Draco asked again, looking away.

Potter would love this. Draco would love it too—he would have all the time AND all the light afterwards.

“I can walk to most places without getting lost,” Potter replied, seeming to accept the interruption, his curiosity at the scheme Draco was brewing evident in his tilted chin and wide eyes.

“Can you imagine what Little Whinging would look like, if you and I are looking from the Ferris wheel in the Harvest Fair?”

Potter thought for a moment. “I know the roads and buildings, but the rooftops…” He shook his head.

But Draco knew the birds’ eye view of Little Whinging in his mind—that was the perspective of the town’s map in the Manor. After all, the map had been created for the Dementors, who’d located their targets in flight. Draco’d studied the map when he’d built the chocolate house. Some details were fuzzy, of course, but combined with Potter’s recollection—

He felt more like a worm than a serpent when he wriggled his way down Potter’s body, felt under the seat and pulled out a small glass basin, dusty from its lack of use, the chains passing through the rings along its rim rusted from rain and snow.

Kneeling, Draco retrieved his own wand from above the seat and handed it, tip pointing downward, to Potter. “Put in the best memory you have about Little Whinging,” he said. As Potter took hold of the hawthorn wand again, Draco felt warmth inside his chest, as if he’d hold Draco’s hand—wasn’t it true that in Celtic folklore, hawthorn could heal a broken heart? “Every detail of the town—houses, trees, signs and eckeltricity things. All that you’d noticed, loved and hated.”

When Potter watched Draco did the same, he didn’t ask from where Draco had drawn his memory, didn’t ask what Draco was going to show him. He merely reached into his vest for two pieces of chocolates—once again, the decadent ones from Wizarding Switzerland—blew on them and fed one to Draco and the other to himself.

He’d known, of course. Potter always knew.

The steel chains straightened out, Draco Levitated the basin and hanged it on a hook in the passenger’s car. Gold and silver swirls glowed from within the glass, but the light seemed to gather substance, turning the air into smoke as they rose and filled the space.

Propped up on his elbow, Potter watched on beside Draco. The unfamiliarity of the magic surrounding them didn’t seem to faze him at all. In fact, it appeared to pacify and excite him—the way he was smiling, the way he was sucking on the piece of sweet in his mouth…

The way he was drawing circles on Draco’s hand. “Close your eyes,” he said.

Draco did—until Potter squeezed Draco’s hand and said, “Look.”

Their passenger car was rising on the Ferris wheel. It was a sunny day in this other world, the sky high and blue, the air crisp as Autumn’s.

The scenery wasn’t real. It didn’t pretend to be, either.

Right below the Ferris wheel, where the Harvest Fair should be taking place, was a span of white, as if the wheel was turning above a bed of candy floss. The lack of details was expected—for neither Draco nor Harry had been to the Fair—but it was the faraway, panoramic view of Little Whinging that made this world so impossible. So much like a fairy tale.

Potter had moved to lean on the railing of the passenger car, surveying the town that spanned before them. He’d shaken off his unbuttoned vest and left it lying unceremoniously on the floor, and the thin fabric of his shirt hugged his torso and his arms as it flapped in the wind. His words flew wild like his hair—unmanageable, incomprehensible. He didn’t look like a wizard who’d seen too much in his life, but rather, a child who’d seen his home from the skies for the first time.

And it was, except the town not only had streets and flowers and trees, it also had chocolates—trails and hills of onion-shaped little pieces topped with a paper tag. They lined the alleyways, gathered like Autumn leaves in the corners of small playgrounds and backyards, places where Draco’s and Potter’s memory could no longer place the details.

His memories of building a house for Potter had been mixed with the ones of him reading the Wizarding map. The sweet adornments in the town below them echoed how he’d organized the sweets on his worktable—the silver ones, their wrapping intact and their _Hugs and Kisses_ tags on display, made their own piles along the edges, while the others formed heaps of brown and white, placed close to Draco’s hands so that he’d been able to reach for them without having to look.

A rough yank pulled on his robe and before Draco could let out a yelp, he found himself sandwiched between the railing and Potter—

—and snogged senseless.

The face that’d finally pulled away from Draco was flush. The spectacles were askew and the eyes behind them bright. “I think Uncle Vernon just crashed into a Kiss,” he said, grinning ear-to-ear.

Draco reckoned that he’d meant his Uncle’s car had run into a piece of chocolate—it didn’t matter, for the way Potter was looking at him, talking to him was nothing but pure joy, as if he’d got the best present ever, the best token of gratitude the whole Wizarding World could offer—far better than an Order of Merlin, the centrefold collection of every Quidditch Hunk of the Year and a wardrobeful of Truthful Reporting Auror robes combined—

“Well, well, well.” The resilience and flexibility of Malfoy Pride ® was on full display when Draco drawled… while still bent and squashed against the handrail. “And I thought I was the one who’d crashed into a kiss. Who did it better? Me or your Uncle?”

“Don’t flatter yourself. You against my Uncle?” Potter asked, all cheek. He drew Draco’s long hair back with his fingers, cupped his face and replied, “Yours felt good. His was funnier.”

“You sadistic, do-no-gooder Gryffindor.” Draco narrowed his eyes in mock menace. “You do enjoy other people’s misfortunes, do you?”

“Yeah.” Potter scooped Draco’s body up with one arm and they stood face-to-face, eye-to-eye. “Especially when a suicidal dildo jumps out my window. I wish WWN were there—Episode 1 of The Figuratively Arseholish and but Literally Phallic Wizard from Potter’s Flat.”

“How presumptuous of me,” Draco said, tutting, “to think my Ministry-appointed hexing bag would express interest in my survival.” Draco reached downward and cupped the swell on Potter’s jeans. As he kneaded it, he leaned forward, captured Potter’s earlobe with his lips and whispered. “And would be the arsehole to my phallus.”

“That will be the final statement in the case file.” Potter replied between moans as Draco pushed him towards the seat, lay him on his back and knelt between his spread thighs once more. “You think MLE will believe in the Little Whinging down there?”

“That it has chocolate for streets and parks?”

“That it’s that brand of chocolate and you used them all on me. ”

“Why, because they’re atrocious and I hate you that much?”

“No, because they say _Kisses_ …” Potter muttered a spell and their clothes were gone. Nothing—not even an epic battle between Hodrod the Horny-Handed and Urg the Unclean—could distract them any time soon. “And you love me that much.”

 

 

_~ Fin_

 

 

 


End file.
